


Secret of The Sixth

by Death



Category: Divergent Series - Veronica Roth, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Divergent + Hunger Games Crossover, F/M, Fear, Other, Suicide, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-05
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-03-16 12:36:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 56,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3488501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Death/pseuds/Death
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Erudite succeeded in taking over the faction system years ago and made many major modifications to it. The biggest of these changes may have been the creation of a sixth faction. To keep order, they discouraged kids from transferring by creating The Hunger Games, in which only children who transfer are eligible for reaping. When Beatrice transfers to Dauntless, will she be reaped? Though she has one month of training in Dauntless before The Reaping, she is scared that she will have to participate in the games. She will soon come to learn that there is more to the games than meets the eye...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Tris is the main character (3rd person). All characters are the same age as they are within their respective books.  
> The story opens the day before the choosing ceremony, the actual games don't start till later in the story (you'll see why). Story set 50 years after the Erudite succeeded in overthrowing the Abnegation, and a lot changed because of that. This first chapter explains how everything works in this world and is done so by Tris in the form of a school assignment (weird start huh?)
> 
> Hope you enjoy it!

 

***

**Assignment:** _Write an essay in which you discuss the history of our fair city and why the Hunger Games are justified. Keep the following questions in mind while writing._

_\- "Why would the Erudite create a sixth faction?"_

_\- "Why would transferring between factions be discouraged?"_

_\- "Why would the factions train their children for The Hunger Games?"_

_Also, reconsider using the word "Divergent" if the urge presents itself. Thanks you._

_Good luck!_

 

***

A Historical Essay by: Beatrice Prior

The Six Factions and The Great Overthrow

Fifty years ago, Erudite brought order and peace to the peoples of our city. Before this peace, the five factions – Erudite, Abnegation, Dauntless, Candor, and Amity – lived calmly while maintaining healthy relationships with each other for a long time. This lasted for one hundred years until the people of Abnegation began to abuse their positions of power as heads of government. Along with the Abnegations negligence, the people we refer to as "Divergents" were also threatening the system. Their numbers grew, and their inability to conform to the ways of a single faction made them dangerous. The Divergent if left unchecked would destroy the foundation of the faction system, and a world without factions, where no one knew where they belonged, is above all else unthinkable. Abnegation, being no stranger to committing crimes in the past, hid these threats from detection if they were to come across them. Abnegation had to be stopped, and in being unable to reason with them, Erudite had no other choice then to use force.

With knowledge as their voice and the Dauntless by their side, they brought an end to the tyrannical rule of an entire faction, thus liberating the remaining four. The Abnegation and Divergent were held accountable for their sins, and many lives were lost. Every single Divergent, even those who were factionless, were executed. The Erudite made the right choice as they always have.

But what was the destiny of this new world? Abnegations population decreased drastically, and the remaining four factions mutual fear of the Divergents resurfacing lead to panic. This pushed the Erudite to form one of their greatest ideas to date. They would create a sixth faction.

The new faction was founded on loyalty, and its name was to be Stalwart. It was to be filled with humble people who focused on maintaining interpersonal ties and trustworthiness. The world needed more loyalty. Abnegation proved to us that without it, our system would fail.

Volunteers from Amity and Candor were taken from their factions and used to create Stalwart. It was a good faction that chose to use a pale purple to make up their faction attire, and the colour has remained constant since it's founding.

And so, peace once again returned to the factions. Abnegation was forgiven, Erudite took its rightful place as our governmental leaders, and the new faction produced hardworking people that came to provide structural maintenance and electrical power for the entirety of the city. This came with the discovery of a new energy source that was practically undying. The Stalwart, with Erudite's guidance, rebuilt the city and its roads, and the boundaries that we lived within increased exponentially in mere years. All was good, till the Erudite and Stalwart noticed a horrifying trend.

It seemed that the percentage of faction transfers was increasing more and more each year. Before the rebuilding of our system and the overthrow of Abnegation, the Choosing Ceremony – in which children of sixteen years of age could decide whether to stay with their faction or leave and join another – was a joyous time where ones aptitude for a faction left them thinking they could roam freely. This choice, it seemed, was actually the cause of all our societies problems to begin with. What makes each faction unique is its peoples likeness in thoughts. Switching factions meant that you introduced the people you transferred to the ways of your old life. The seeds of your past ways were planted in the heads of the people around you. This left the unity in thought those people shared susceptible to corruption. Transferring could only mean the destruction of what the Erudite fought so hard for. And thus the Hunger Games were born.

These games, though it is anything but an actual game, were meant to discourage the transferring of children from one faction to another. Every year, one month after the Choosing Ceremony, any children who chose to transfer would have their names entered into a lottery. One boy and one girl transfer - if possible - from each faction would inevitably have their name selected, and that meant that they were chosen to participate. This selection event is called "The Reaping."

The Hunger Games, overall, is a bloody event in which the transfers selected must fight to the death in an arena until only one remains alive. The victor will be allowed to return to the faction they transferred to.

Usually, twenty-five percent of the transfers are reaped from a faction, but the Erudite have the final say. The amount of children reaped depends on the number of transfers that year, but they can be adjusted to suit the needs of each individual faction. For example, if Candor received four transfers while Dauntless received twelve, then most likely only one child would be reaped from Candor while the Dauntless can choose to have six reaped.

In light of this new development, the remaining four factions were – of course – horrified. Though in the end, it didn't take the factions long to accept the Erudite's logic and get with the program. The Abnegation, Candor, and even the Amity and Erudite began to train their children at a young age to fight in case they ever chose to transfer. The Abnegation did this out of selflessness, for if one of their children transferred and was reaped, then they needed to be able to rest easy knowing that they helped their son or daughter. The Candor trained their kids most likely for the same reason the Abnegation did, though they would never admit it. The Amity trained them out of love, since no one wanted to see their child dead on a screen, and the Erudite trained their kids since it was only logical to have them be able to protect themselves.

Dauntless born had already been training to become soldiers for as long as they could remember, so their ability to fight was far ahead of any other transfers they would came up against. The newest faction however refused to train their children, for if they transferred, then they went against everything their faction valued. They were being disloyal. However, within the one-month period between the Choosing Ceremony and The Games, they would train their transfers as a sign of loyalty to potentially new members of their faction.

The training the Abnegation children received along with the Amity kids paled in comparison to what the Dauntless were being taught. And that is why, if any kids choose to transfer at all that year, the Dauntless who were reaped almost always won.

In all the years that the Hunger Games have been held, only eight out of the forty-six victors did not originate from Dauntless. Out of the eight, three were Erudite. Two were Candor. Two originated from Amity of all factions. And only one from Abnegation. As for the sixth faction Stalwart, the children who originated from them had a zero percent survival rate.

The Hunger Games are used as a way to both scare our younger population out of switching factions, and also to show us the importance of faction loyalty. With minimal faction transfers, the sense of community within each faction has lead to the overall happiness of each individual living there. The Games benefit each and every one of us by protecting us from ourselves.

The Erudite, in their benevolence, allowed for the aptitude tests to continue. Partly because they wished to continue monitoring the population in case any Divergent were somehow birthed into our city, but also to supply us with knowledge about ourselves. But if we do have aptitude for a faction other then our own, choosing to switch hurts hundreds of people in the process. Our families, our entire faction, our new chosen faction, along with ourselves are open to depression, and that disease is not something that we can wish away.

That is why we should not leave the faction we are born into. To disregard the order that Erudite brought us would be selfish. It would be stupid. We would be lying to ourselves, and acting out of cowardice. But above all else, we would be showing disloyalty. The six things that each faction stands for would crumble to nothing as it did all those years ago, and the peace founded on Jeanine Matthews The Valiant's hard work would have been for nothing. We would be lost.

We can only hope now that the Divergent have died off, and that the number of faction transfers remains as low as it has been since the creation of the games.

May our transfers for this year understand that if they are reaped, that it is for their own good. We in this great city that was founded on honesty, selflessness, kindness, loyalty, bravery and a thirst for knowledge, collectively pray that the odds... be ever in their favor.


	2. Chapter 2

In the darkness, she could only focus on the sound of rain. Its light taps against her window being the only audible thing vibrating through the walls and ceilings and floors of her home. It was gentle, but filled her up with a feeling that she had come to realize was complete and utter terror. The rain, she thought, was an omen. An omen foreshadowing her destruction. A wave of dread that would sweep away her entire world with murky rain water, leaving nothing behind but regret and disappointment. She took in a shaky breath, and forced herself to relax.

"Easy Beatrice… Easy," she whispered into her pillow, more for her own reassurance than anything else. "You'll make the right choice."

For a moment, she forgot about everything that was keeping her up. She forgot about the choosing ceremony that took place tomorrow, the pressure to stay with her faction, and even the inconclusive aptitude test. And maybe, just maybe, she forgot that she was the first Divergent born in at least fifty years.

It was a painful sort of forgetting. The kind that only came before a storm of memory so violent it left you wishing you were dead. And in Beatrice's case, she might as well be.

_"You're the first we've seen since…"_ her aptitude test instructor, who said her name was Tori, didn't need to finish her sentence. Why she let her go Beatrice would never understand, but her warning telling Beatrice to never speak of her divergence to anyone scared her more then she thought possible.

The coo of her brothers snoring next door brought her back to the present, and she sniffed back tears as she remembered his words to her before they went to bed. "Tomorrow, we have to think of our family Beatrice, but… We must also think of ourselves."

He was right. She knew that she didn't belong in Abnegation, but whether he knew that too was a mystery to her. Would he miss her if she transferred? Though she wanted it to be easy for him and hate her for leaving their faction, she prayed that he would long to see her again. Wishing for that felt selfish, and the thin walls holding back sobs from leaving her body began to crack under pressure.

Her home in Abnegation, where she had lived for the past sixteen years of her life, was all Beatrice ever knew. Could she really leave it all in less then twelve hours? She didn't. No… Couldn't truly want to leave her family. What would it do to them? Leave them empty? Barren? Wandering if it was something they did that made her leave? They would never know that it had nothing to do with them. They would never know that she left because she felt that living out an idle life in Abnegation was the last thing she wanted. They would never know that she didn't belong anywhere because their daughter was Divergent.

Beatrice groaned as she turned in bed and faced the window. The sound of rain filled the room again as she pushed thoughts of her decision tomorrow away for the time being. She needed to rest, but knew that if she even got one hour of sleep that she was lucky.

She forced herself to close her eyes and think of hopeful things. Nothing good came to her.

She remembered the blood soaked streets of last year's arena and how badly she wanted to turn from the screen in her living room. Those games were set in a small town that had one river flowing through its center. With the river being the only water source, the areas around it were stained with nothing but red.

Beatrice shivered and bit her lip, allowing the pain to suppress the surfacing memories of the games she was forced to watch growing up. If she transferred, she could go into those games, and never come out. With only one victor, the chances of her winning were small; and smaller still because of her height and body mass.

You were not supposed to speak ill of the games, or any other faction for that matter. When looking at the garbage that she was being fed, both her and Caleb knew that it was only to keep them where they were born, but Beatrice knew that she was going to do something about it.

She remembered back to the essay she wrote for her teacher the day before. Remembered the role that the games supposedly played and what they stood for. She didn't believe a single word of what she wrote on that paper. Beatrice hated the Erudite for what they created, along with the Stalwart and their willingness to help produce the games. Even the name Stalwart left a bad taste in her mouth. Why would a faction choose such an ugly name for itself?

The sound of rain brought her back to her bedroom and away from traitorous thoughts. Beatrice sighed heavily and relaxed as best she could.

She was scared, but before she fell asleep, she pictured herself wearing not grey after the choosing ceremony, but Dauntless black.

***

The morning came faster then it should have, and left Beatrice groggy from lack of sleep.

Sunlight streamed through her small window and into her bedroom, leaving warm kisses on everything it touched. She only wished that she could feel this security for the rest of her life.

"Good morning Beatrice," came a soft voice to her left. She stretched slowly and looked to see who was standing in her doorway. Caleb, being the early riser he was, stood fully clothed and ready for the day. Again she wondered how he did it. How he managed to always add a splash of colour to the grey that was her existence. But for now, in this moment, she was just happy that he was here for her.

"Morning," she said slowly, failing miserably at suppressing a yawn. "Mom or dad up?"

"No, but they will be soon."

"Oh, alright."

"Something the matter? You seem like you've got a problem," Caleb said, and his ability to read his sister always bugged her.

Beatrice looked down at her hands. All her life consisted of was problems as of late. "No, nothing." She said dryly. Caleb didn't seem happy with her response, but he didn't move from his spot in the doorframe.

He looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, and Beatrice swore that she could sense something more behind his gaze. Was he not telling her something?

"What is it?" she asked. He only shook his head and sighed.

"You've just been a good sister is all," he said while slipping away from the doorframe and back into the hall.

"Been a good sister?" Beatrice whispered to herself. "What does that mean?"

But she knew what it meant. It could only mean one thing. Either Caleb thought that she was going to transfer at the choosing ceremony… Or he was.

***

The bus to The Hub where the choosing ceremony was held each year was packed. Not the I-can-manage-this kind of packed where you still may find a seat, but the kill-me-now kind of packed where you're constantly rubbing shoulders with the person next to you.

Caleb, always being the perfect Abnegation, gave his seat up to an elderly woman traveling with her grandson. Beatrice wished she had thought of moving first, but she didn't.

"Hey," Caleb said, interrupting the silence that stretched on throughout the bus. "You nervous?"

Beatrice considered his words before responding with a "no, not really." She had lied.

"Hmm. Well I hope you don't transfer to Candor, because you're lying to me," Caleb grinned. He only made that face when Beatrice had been caught doing something she shouldn't have, and she hated when he did it. But in this situation, it made her smile as she remembered the memories they shared.

She shook her head and kept her smile from getting too wide. "Oh shut it."

In reality, they both wanted to talk. They wanted to do anything they could to relieve the pressure building up inside them. But something else kept them quiet. For Tris, it was the fear that if she kept talking she would let something slip. She couldn't trust herself not to spill all her secrets to her brother. So she remained silent, not saying what she wanted to, and certainly not saying any sort of 'goodbye'. A goodbye felt too final, and there was still a chance that she would stay. There was still a chance that anything could happen. So she would wait.

***

The Hub was just as packed as the bus that took Caleb and Beatrice to its doorstep. With all the colours of the factions merging together to create a sea of black and red and purple, Beatrice almost got lost. And she would have if it were not for Caleb's hold on her hand. He guided her to the Abnegation seating section of The Hub, and even after they found their parents, he didn't let go.

With her mother on her left and Caleb on her right, Beatrice gave Caleb's hand one final squeeze before letting go and crossing her arms over her body. He looked over at her to read her expression, and concluded that she was just as nervous as he was.

Looking down from where she sat, Beatrice saw the six glass bowls that represented each faction sitting pristinely on a large marble table. Seeing the Amity bowl on the far left filled with dirt, and the Dauntless bowl near the center with its red hot coals made her feel a little nauseous. But what truly made her feel sick was the Stalwart bowl on the far right filled with its silver and bronze coins.

_"What an ugly name for a faction,"_ Beatrice thought again, she just couldn't get over its oddness.

The two had a big decision to make, but neither knew that the other had already made up their mind. They both could only hope that their parents would still at least respect their decision.

A hush fell over the crowd, and Beatrice swallowed hard as all eyes fell to the center of the room. Marcus Eaton, the head of Abnegation, was hosting the choosing ceremony that year, and his soft eyes and rough exterior could easily have been considered attractive if they weren't hidden by Abnegation Grey.

He stood from his spot where the other faction leaders sat, and made his way to the center of the room. He now stood in front of the table with the glass bowls.

Marcus began to speak, and his voice was laced with the sound of what Beatrice thought to be leadership. He seemed sure of himself, and she only wished that she held that resolve within herself.

"Today," he said, his voice crisp and clear. "Is the day of the choosing ceremony."

He paused and scanned the room, taking in each factions colour's. "On this day the dependents of our city will shed their skins and transform into full fledged members of our society. They must choose between one of the six factions that exist within our city. The peaceful will go to Amity. The honest, to Candor. The intelligent, to Erudite. The brave, to Dauntless. And the loyal to Stalwart. The right to choose is something that cannot be taken from any of us. Good luck, choose wisely, and may the odds be ever in your favor."

With that, Marcus stepped away from his spot in front of the table, and opened the small black box behind him. He lifted its lid, and pulled out the first ceremonial dagger. Its silver edge glistened in the natural light of The Hub, and Beatrice tensed at the sight of it.

When the time came, she would have to cut her hand, and let the blood drip into one of the six bowls, thus choosing to either transfer or stay where she belonged.

"Arthur Write," Marcus called, and a tall boy with dark skin from Stalwart stood and marched his way onto the stage. His purple scarf swung from side to side as he walked on till he reached the tables were Marcus stood. The boy accepted the knife and brought it to his hand, making a small cut. His blood dripped onto the coins in the Stalwart bowl.

"Stalwart," Marcus announced. The boys entire faction applauded as if he made the right choice. As if he actually had any choice.

The first name had been read, and the crowd settled in for a long list of children's names. Marcus would read out the sixteen year olds last names in descending order from Z to A, and go through an entire faction before moving onto the next. This year they started with Stalwart, and then would go to the other side of the room and do Amity. The Abnegation would be last this year since the host of the ceremony belonged to that faction, so that meant that Beatrice and Caleb were in for a long wait before their names would be called.

Marcus worked his way down the list, making it through all the W's, V's, and U's without any surprises, though one girl did trip and nearly break her neck. But then Marcus got to the M section, and everything changed.

"Peeta Mellark," Marcus called, and a boy with short dirty blonde hair and a muscular frame stood up a little too quickly. There was something off about the entirety of his look, and Beatrice couldn't quite put her finger on what it was. To put it simply, he just didn't look like he belonged in that purple. As he moved to edge his way past the kids next to him, he nearly tripped, but barely caught himself by grabbing the chair in front of him. His scarf nearly touched the ground as he awkwardly made his way to Marcus and the table, and Beatrice wandered why he couldn't figure out how to tie his scarf the way the other boys did in his faction. He seemed nervous, and she had a feeling that she knew why.

Reaching the center of the room, the boy took the blade from Marcus's hands. He now turned his attention to the Stalwart bowl.

He put the knife to his hand, but hesitated as he looked back and into the Stalwart crowd.

Beatrice couldn't tell what he was looking at, but suddenly the boy was filled with resolve, and a new look of determination now sat firmly on his face.

He turned back to the table, cut his hand, and walked away from the coins in the Stalwart bowl. The only thing audible in the room was the sizzle of blood on Dauntless coals.

"Dauntless," Marcus called, and the entire room gasped in horror.

***

This boy, Peeta Mellark as Beatrice remembered, had done the impossible. He went against everything that the world wanted from him and chose to go where he must have known he belonged. He was amazing.

"Peeta!" shouted a girls voice from the Stalwart section. "No!"

Beatrice looked over to see if she could tell who the voice came from, and saw a pale girl with a long dark braid hanging over one shoulder standing above the others in her section. She wore a purple cardigan and skirt, and Beatrice guessed that she knew the boy who transferred very well. She must have been scared for him. Or extremely disappointed.

Looking back down to the boy named Peeta, Beatrice saw that he had already made his way to the Dauntless section of the room. His new faction cheered him on and gave him pats on the back as he took a seat next to a girl with red streaks in her hair. He looked uncomfortable, but couldn't stop staring back at the girl with the braid who called his name in the Stalwart section.

"Quiet please! Everyone quiet down!" Marcus yelled, and though it took some time, Marcus was finally able to read from the list again.

The entire room was in shock as they always were at the first transfer, but the fact that it was from loyal faction made everything see surreal. The percentage of transfers from their was almost non-existent.

But suddenly, another boy from Stalwart transferred, and he chose Candor.

Then another transferred, and another, and it felt as if the world were ending before everyones eyes. Never in the history of the city had so many kids transferred in the same year from Stalwart. Never.

"Katniss Everdeen," Marcus shouted, and his voice was barely audible over the shouts of protest in the room.

The same girl with the long braid stood up in the Stalwart section and ran to the center of the room. She didn't hesitate to take the knife and spill her blood onto the Dauntless coals. She ran to the Dauntless and pulled the boy Peeta from her faction into her arms. They remained still for a long time, simply embracing one another, till the girl Katniss pulled back and looked to be yelling at the boy in her arms.

Marcus only wanted to finish up with the ceremony, and once the room settled down, he continued with his list.

***

The number of kids transferring that year was well over seventy. At one point, Beatrice lost count, and that scared her horribly. What was it that made so many kids transfer? She hadn't been paying attention to what was happening around her, and before she knew it, her brothers name was called.

"Caleb Prior," Marcus said, and Caleb stood.

Beatrice was still processing the sheer number of kids her age transferring. It couldn't be happening. It wasn't possible.

Suddenly she took in a sharp breath that made her mother jump beside her. If that many kids had already transferred, then what were the hunger games for this year going to look like?

"Erudite," Markus announced, and Beatrice looked up to see her brothers hand outstretched over the water in the Erudite bowl. The people around Beatrice all started yelling, but she couldn't hear anything accept for Marcus's next words.

"Beatrice Prior!" he shouted over the thunder of voices.

Beatrice looked over at her parents, who still getting over the shock of losing a son, gave her troubled looks as they both reached out to touch her. Her mothers hand came to her shoulder, and Beatrice met her father half way by taking his hand in hers.

"We love you," her mother said in a hushed voice. "No matter what."

With that, Beatrice stood and took a deep breath.

The angry whispers and shouts ringing throughout the room stopped as she stood, and all the blood in her body rushed to her head. She realized then that Caleb was the first transfer from all of Abnegation. If she didn't stay, then her parents would be lost. For a moment, Beatrice took into consideration the things she had written in that essay she gave to her teacher a few days before, but quickly thought better of it.

She stepped slowly towards Marcus, and wandered if her brother had felt the same way she did while making this journey to the table. Was he afraid or anxious even? Of course he must have been, but being the first Divergent in decades must not have been weighing on his mind.

Suddenly she was in front of Marcus, and his eyes that seemed so soft at the beginning of the ceremony were now cold and unforgiving.

He held the knife out in front of him, and trembling, Beatrice took it. Turning her attention to the bowls representing each faction, she walked to stand in front of the Abnegation bowl; its grey stones stained with the blood of her neighbours and schoolmates.

Something changed in her in that moment as she looked down at the red blood on grey stones. Something wasn't the same, and she knew that she could not allow herself to belong to Abnegation. And just like that, she wasn't afraid.

Her blood would not be tied to her family anymore. It would belong to another faction.

She dug the blade into her left hand, and held it out over the hot coals. A single droplet of blood was all it took to change her life forever.

"Dauntless," Marcus announced. And instead of shouts of protest, the crowd fell silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**Next Time:**_ Beatrice and her fellow initiates travel to Dauntless, only to have disappointing news dropped on them. Also, Peeta and Al form a friendship, thus bringing Katniss and Peeta closer to the already forming friend group of Beatrice, Christina, Will, and Al.


	3. Chapter 3

The quiet of the room shook her like an earthquake.

Beatrice had just chosen Dauntless, and not a single person in the room made a sound. She thought that they must have been shocked into a silent stupor, but what hurt her most was the fact that even the Dauntless were silent.

Did they not want her? Well, it was too late for her to turn back, and they couldn't throw her out yet.

The only audible thing that remained in the room was the sound of Beatrice's footsteps echoing as she walked. It wasn't until she took her seat next to the boy in purple who was the first transfer that a chorus of angry whispers began to resonate in the room. Beatrice looked down at the floor feeling disappointed.

"Welcome to Dauntless, guess we're in for one hell of a ride," a voice beside her whispered.

She looked to her side and saw that the boy with the loose purple scarf was giving her a weak smile. "Thanks," she whispered back. "I think you're right."

The girl with the braid beside him gave him a look that seemed to say _"don't talk to her,"_ and both Peeta and Beatrice looked at the floor again.

Beatrice couldn't remember the last time an Abnegation transferred to Dauntless, perhaps that was why the crowd was so shocked. For a moment she allowed herself to regret her decision, but quickly pushed the feeling back down. This was where she belonged now. She knew this was true because she wanted for it to be true, so it would be. And before she knew it, Marcus Eaton had finished the list of children for the Abnegation section of The Hub.

The choosing ceremony was over, and herself and Caleb were the only transfers from Abnegation.

***

With Marcus's last words affectively closing the ceremony, everyone stood at once. Words like "betrayal" and "disbelief" were being used left and right as the number of children transferring sank in.

"I can't believe how many kids transferred!" one Dauntless born shouted to Beatrice's right. The girl next to him gave him a worried look.

"Imagine what the games will be like this year!" she shouted back, and Beatrice's stomach dropped.

She had almost forgotten about the games and their bloodied reputation. But on second thought, anything seemed better than a dull life in Abnegation; or at least she told herself that.

Suddenly the crowd of Dauntless was moving to exit the building, and Beatrice had almost forgotten that she had to go with them.

"Hey! Keep up _stiff!_ " yelled a voice.

The shout brought her back to the present moment, but she couldn't leave without seeing her parents one last time.

She looked up and turned, scanning the grey sea stretched out behind her. Had her parents really left without even looking up to see her off? There was no way they could have gone, so she kept searching. Finally, her eyes came to rest on those of her mother.

She had a soft look in her eyes, and Beatrice didn't know how to respond. She expected anger, even a reluctance to meet her gaze, but still her mother looked at her as if she were still her daughter.

Before turning away, Beatrice saw a faint smile light up her mothers face as she mouthed something to her. Unfortunately, Beatrice couldn't quite figure out what it was, so looked forward and began to move with the Dauntless crowd.

She was now just about to pass through the doors of The Hub and pour outside and onto the streets where she would run back to the Dauntless part of the city, but before she could make it out, she looked back and saw her father give her a slight nod. He wasn't angry either, but the softness of her mothers features didn't grace him the same way. He still looked disappointed, but she understood why.

Finally Beatrice gave up on her parents. 'Faction over blood' was a saying commonly used in the time before The Great Overthrow, and now more then ever, Beatrice had to believe in that saying. If she didn't, she was sure she would go insane with grief over missing her parents and brother.

Suddenly, Beatrice understood what her mother had mouthed to her.

 _"No matter what,"_ she had said. The words stuck, and Beatrice couldn't help but smile to herself.

No matter what, she would love her parents and brother, and they would remember to love her.

***

The Dauntless group broke into an all out sprint that left Beatrice straining hard just to keep up. Her slack grey dress slapped against her body making her feel slow and less agile than the other transfers who were quickly pulling away from her. She looked up and saw streaks of Blue and yellow merging in with the black uniforms of the Dauntless pack, and Beatrice felt inferior. But she couldn't let herself give up.

She pumped her arms harder and forced herself to take deep breaths as the Dauntless began to round a corner and enter into a part of the city she had never seen before. She was the last to make it there.

Suddenly Beatrice could see where the pack was headed, and gasped audibly as she forced herself to keep running.

The raised train tracks that ran throughout the city were about one hundred meters ahead, and Dauntless were already climbing its metal pillars in order to stand by the tracks.

Once she finally reached the pillars, she grabbed hold of a rung inside it and tried to pull herself up, but the light grey sweater overtop her dress restricted her arm movements.

"Take off your sweater!" A familiar voice called out. Beatrice looked to her left, and saw that at the pillar beside her the Stalwart boy who sat beside her was about to start climbing as well. Following with her eyes up the beam, Beatrice saw that his other friend with the long braid was already at the top of the raised platform and looking down at her companion.

Peeta turned his attention back to the task at hand and quickly untied his scarf and threw it to the ground. With that out of the way he took off his sweater and swung it over his shoulders and began to climb.

Beatrice didn't need to be told twice. She let go of the pillar and shrugged off her own sweater. The air was cold, but it would feel colder if she never made it to Dauntless.

With her arms free, she began to climb.

She was half way up when the pillar began to tremble beneath her, and she knew that it was only a matter of time before the train would arrive, she had to hurry.

The vibrations ringing through the metal platform grew and grew till the sound of the oncoming train was all anyone could hear, and just as Beatrice pulled herself up and onto the platform, the train had reached the pack of Dauntless and initiates.

Everyone began running alongside the train, and before she knew it kids were already opening doors and jumping inside.

Beatrice wasn't surprised, she had seen the Dauntless kids jump out of moving trains on their way to school before. To them, it was just a way of moving around. It seemed fun from a distance, but actually doing it was a different feeling entirely.

She stood quickly and ran, barely keeping up with the pack of Dauntless as she noticed that the raised platform was thinning out. If she didn't jump onto the train soon, she would fall off the platform and become factionless. Without a faction, she would starve to death on the streets of the city, and the fear woke her up. She looked to her left as an open train car door whizzed past her. The next open car coming up fast was the last one on the train, and she had to make it.

Trying her best to calm her beating heart and time her dive to the side perfectly, she held her breath, turned, and jumped as far as she could to the left.

The platform was no longer beneath her, and her body had landed inside the train car. Her legs kicked wildly behind her as she dragged herself inside.

She had done it, the hard part was over.

***

Sitting up in the car, Beatrice expected the entirety of her new faction to be pointing and laughing at her. She was a stiff after all, a girl from Abnegation who was the least likely to make it through whatever Dauntless initiation was like, but to her surprise, no one looked sideways at her. A few even gave her a pat on the back or a high five as she edged herself away from the open doors of the train and against a wall.

A Candor girl dressed in a black and white blazer sat breathlessly to her right. Since they were both transfers, there was already a loose connection between them, and the Candor girl seemed to notice it.

"Is it just me…" she said, pausing in order to take a deep breath. "Or are they trying to kill us?"

Beatrice allowed herself to laugh lightly and throw her head back as wind pushed her hair out of her tight bun.

"Yeah," she laughed. "I wouldn't be surprised."

"Well I would be," came a voice not far from the Candor girls right. "Why kill off potential members of your faction?"

It was a boy, and he had a crisp blue blazer on with a pair of glasses tucked into its front pocket. He was obviously a transfer from Erudite.

The Candor girl was quick with a response. "Hmm why would anyone do that? Oh wait, they do do that. Ever heard of the hunger games?"

Beatrice was taken aback by her sharp attitude, but the joking tone in her voice seemed to lessen the weight of her words. The Erudite boy smiled at her.  
"Fair enough," he said. "I'm Will."

"Christina," the Candor girl said as she pushed her short dark hair away from her eyes. Suddenly she looked back at Beatrice. "And you?"

"I'm Beatrice," she said, sounding a little nervous. "From Abnegation."

"Well we can see that," laughed Christina, and for some reason, Beatrice found herself smiling back.

A lull in the conversation gave Beatrice time to look around at the rest of the people in her section of the train. From what she could see, there were at least six faction transfers around her, but judging from how many transfers there actually were that year, there must have been more throughout the train.

Finally her eyes came to rest on the Stalwart boy who she sat beside when she first set foot in the Dauntless section of The Hub. Why could she never remember his name? She thought for some reason that it was some sort of… bread maybe.

"Peeta," Beatrice gasped as the name finally came back to her.

"Huh?" Christina questioned beside her. Beatrice looked over at her before pursing her lips.

"Oh, sorry," she said. "The boy transfer from Stalwart. I think his name was Peeta."

"You're right," Will chimed in. "And his girlfriend over there is Katniss."

"Why the hell do the Stalwart give their kids such weird names?" said Christina, obviously not caring whether other people could hear her or not.

Will shook his head as he gave Christina a look. "Oh man is it ever obvious you're from Candor!" he laughed.

"How so?" Christina snapped.

"Well I mean, you have no filter you just say whatever comes into your head!"

"Oh yeah sure, well at least we have personalities okay? Unlike the people from someones faction," Christina teased. She was met with a warm laugh from Will before he turned his attention to Beatrice.

"Well what do you think Beatrice? Think the Candor have no filter but great personalities?"

She didn't answer, and instead watched the boy named Peeta as another transfer from Candor joined the conversation he was having with Katniss.

"Beatrice?" Christina asked hesitantly.

"Oh? Sorry, I just, um. I got distracted by just how many transfers there were is all. I've never really talked to kids from Stalwart before."

"Yeah, well, they get the nickname warts for a reason. They're super clingy," Will said as he rolled his eyes.

Beatrice pretended she didn't hear what Will had said as she continued to watch the odd interaction between two Stalwart kids and a Candor boy.

Suddenly, Peeta's eyes flashed over to Beatrice, and she sat up straighter as he gave her a small smile. Without a second thought she waved him over.

Suddenly Christina nudged Beatrice with her elbow. "Sure you want to do that? That girl seems freaky."

"He was nice to me," Beatrice said. Her answer was simple, but Christina didn't seem to mind the extra company. Will on the other hand seemed a bit quizzical toward the whole thing.

Peeta looked over at Katniss as if asking for permission to move, and Beatrice noticed that without her scarf or cardigan, she had a slight frame and sharp features. Peeta whispered something to her, and she nodded. Looking over at the Candor boy he was talking to, Peeta nodded his head in Beatrice's direction, and the three began to slowly edge their way closer toward Beatrice, Christina, and Will. The moving train kept their steps slow and small.

"Hi," said Peeta a little too quietly as he finally reached Beatrice. He looked her right in the eyes, but his voice was barely audible over the whistle of the wind buzzing through the train.

"You guys want to sit?" Christina said after a beat. "We were just discussing why Candor is better then Erudite, thought we needed more people to witness my victory."

"Oh please that's not how it was going at all!" Will said in an odd tone of voice, but the sincere smile on his face made it obvious he wasn't mad.

Peeta looked over at Katniss before she gave Beatrice, Christina, and Will a long once over and sat down with her legs crossed close to Beatrice.

"Guess we're staying," said Peeta with a smile.

"That's good," Beatrice answered, and Peeta and the Candor boy both sat down.

Christina suddenly gave the other boy with Peeta a strange look. They were both transfers from the same faction, so Beatrice assumed that they must have known each other.

"Al?" Christina asked. "Wait. Are you telling me that _you_ transferred to _Dauntless_? No way! Can't believe you had aptitude for it!"

Al gave her a weak smile, a look that seemed out of place on the body of a sixteen year old who could easily be mistaken for a grown man. "Me neither," he said, and almost instantly Beatrice understood why Peeta and this boy from Candor had approached each other. They both seemed strong, but gentle with their approach to certain situations. At first glance they seemed to have a lot in common, though physically Al was a bit taller than Peeta.

Suddenly Peeta sat up straight and cleared his throat before speaking. "I'm Peeta," he announced over the sound of wind. "And this is my friend Katniss. We've been close for a long time."

The girl with the braid gave a small smile to everyone in the group, though it didn't reach her eyes. She seemed uncomfortable, but so was Beatrice, so she wanted to do what she could to make her realize they were in the same boat.

"Katniss is a nice name," Beatrice murmured shyly. "How'd you get it?"

Katniss froze for a moment as if remembering something painful before adjusting her braid and taking in a deep breath. "My father named me. Katniss is a type of flower that grew near our house in the banks of this little pond out back. I always thought the name was odd."

"Oh! I've heard of that plant!" Will shouts, bringing all eyes to him. "Sagittaria sagittifolia. Its an aquatic plant and mainly blooms in shades of white and pink."

Christina scoffed before giving Will a smirk. "What textbook did you swallow?" she asks, and the entire group erupted into a heated discussion about why Will knew so much about such boring things.

Peeta and Al both smiled at some joke they had shared, and let Christina and Will in on it, effectively making them both laugh. The only ones not speaking much were Katniss and Beatrice. They made eye contact a few times, but didn't dare say too much or draw attention to themselves.

From what Beatrice could see, Al, Christina, Will, and Peeta were already becoming close, and she had no choice but to allow herself to fall into the friendship group. She didn't mind it at all honestly. She had convinced herself that she would be alone, but that didn't seem to be the case after all.

The only thing troubling her was the constant look of unrest on Katniss' face.

***

"Get ready," A short woman with dark skin and dreadlocks shouted. Her voice was demanding, and the entire group of Dauntless around Beatrice and her friends stood up and began to crowd around the open doors of the moving train.

"What are they doing?" Al asked, his face going pale.

"I think…" Will began, but quickly shut his mouth when he heard a yelp followed by laughter coming from the open doorway.

"They're jumping off!" Christina shouted.

Beatrice and her group were now up and walking toward the open doors. The crowd of Dauntless had thinned exponentially, and all that remained was the rest of the initiates.

In pushing herself as close as she would allow herself to the edge of the train car, Beatrice peered outside and saw buildings flying past her. The Dauntless really were jumping off the train, and they each had landed on a building that wasn't too far from them. Still, she was scared.

"Okay," Peeta started. "We have to follow their lead and-"

He stopped short as Katniss ran to the opposite wall facing the open door, and began running. The group separated as she jumped effortlessly and landed on her feet on the building that, after seeing Katniss' effort, seemed a hundred meters away.

"Whoa," Will and Christina gasped in synchrony.

Suddenly Peeta was moving back to the same spot Katniss had gone to. "We have to go now!" he shouted, and before anyone could stop him he was off the train and rolling along the rooftop that Katniss had just landed on.

The remaining initiates didn't need to be told twice. The next to jump was Will and Al, and with limited time before the train blew past the building everyone else had emptied on to, Christina and Beatrice had to move fast.

"Okay," Christina choked out, her voice tight with adrenaline. "Together?"

Beatrice nodded in agreement as her and Christina both ran to the opposite wall of the train. Grabbing each other's hands for support, they ran at the open car door and threw themselves out.

For a moment all Beatrice could focus on was the weightless feeling in her stomach, the soundless whistle of wind against her cheeks, and the uncertainty of whether she would land safely or not, but then the flat rooftop of the building rushed up to meet her.

***

They had done it. The entire group of transfers being Beatrice, Christina, Will, Al, Katniss, and Peeta had all jumped and made it onto the rooftop. Beatrice couldn't help but wonder what other crazy stunts the Dauntless would have them do.

Beatrice and Christina stood as Will and Al walked over to them.

Shaking gravel from her dress, Beatrice noted that the other initiates had already begun to crowd around one of the sides of the building. Looking up above the mess of dauntless initiates, she saw a man who was covered in tattoos and piercings standing on the ledge in front of the crowd. He had his hands in his pockets, and looked to be around twenty years old. The only thing scarier than his dangerous looking exterior was the fact that he may fall off the side of the rooftop at any second. The building, in Beatrice's mind, was at least twenty stories high, and a fall from up here would kill him. The man however didn't seem to care at all.

"Well. Nice of you all to drop by, I'm Eric, a Dauntless leader," the man said, and it took all of Beatrice's will power not to groan at the horrible pun he had just made. Christina however, didn't hold back.

Eric stepped down from the ledge he stood on and began to address the crowd again.

"In order to get into Dauntless," he said. "You already know that you have to show us that you are brave. We don't have time to waste on kids who never belonged here anyway, and that's why we've set this up."

He gestures behind his back at the ledge he was just standing on.

"In order to get into Dauntless and begin initiation, you need to jump off that ledge."

The crowd remained silent, until a few people started to murmur under their breaths while others laughed lightly.

Suddenly, Will took a small step forward. "Well what's at the bottom? Is there uh, water or something?"

Eric gave him a sly grin before looking at the other Dauntless leaders around him. "Guess you'll have to find out," he said. "But before I forget, me and the other leaders have something important to tell you."

The crowd fell silent again as Eric continued.

"During your initiation, you will be ranked. There are three stages in Dauntless training, but each is weighted differently. At the end of the second stage, we'll be making cuts from the group of initiates."

The sudden pause in his speech left the Beatrice and her fellow initiates speechless momentarily. Finally, someone spoke up.

"Cuts? What do you mean by _cuts?_ " asked a Candor boy with dark hair and a lightly freckled face. Beatrice felt Christina cringe beside her.

"What is it?" Beatrice whispered.

"That guy is named Peter," she whispered back. "He's an ass."

Looking back up and away from the boy Christina called Peter, Beatrice found her eyes glued to the Dauntless leader called Eric.

"What I mean by cuts is..." he began, seeming to pause for dramatic affect. "That whoever doesn't meet our required skill level will be kicked out of Dauntless."

The words hit Beatrice like a stone to her chest. She could become factionless. She could become everything she has feared since the moment she realized that the world didn't work the way she thought it did. She was sure if the other initiates were horrified or screaming even, but she couldn't hear them, only the words that Eric spoke next.

"But don't worry," he continued over the frantic gasps and whispers of the crowd. "The way the rankings work won't leave many of you factionless. Since there are twenty-eight of you including transfers, whoever ranks below twenty-two will be forced to leave."

"But thats not fair!" shouts a girl with short black hair standing next to Peter. "If we had known-"

"Then what?" Eric interrupts. "You would have chosen differently? You wouldn't have come to Dauntless? Whether the possibility of you failing initiation resulted in you becoming factionless or not shouldn't have been what made you come here. You got that through your thick skull? You chose us... Now we get to choose you."

No one said a word, and the silence once again was worse than anything Beatrice could imagine.

Eric cleared his through and smiled thoughtfully before speaking again. "Alright then… Who's gonna be our first jumper?"

A hush fell over the crowd, and all eyes fell to the ground.

For some reason, Beatrice found herself looking for Katniss. She already seemed to be the bravest out of the transfers since she was the first one of them to jump from the train, but once she found her in the crowd, she saw that Katniss was also staring back at her.

Something unspoken passed between them in that moment. Katniss was brave and knew it, but Beatrice, she still doubted whether she belonged anywhere. Though she couldn't be sure, it felt as though Katniss was telling her she recognized that they seemed to share the same qualities. And if that were true, then Beatrice was just as capable as she was. Katniss didn't want to be the first jumper, but she wanted for Beatrice to step up.

Before she could stop herself, Beatrice found herself speaking.

"Me," she said. "I'll jump first."

The crowd instantly dissipated, leaving a straight path leading from her to the edge of the building that she was about to jump off of.

She walked fast as to not give herself the chance to give up, and stepped up onto the ledge.

A gust of wind threatened to throw her off the building, but she kept her feet planted firmly on the ledge. She looked over the side, and found that a black hole lay below the street level. That was what she was jumping into, and from this distance it seemed to be a far off thing that could only hide spikes or jagged rocks at its bottom. If it even had a bottom... Beatrice now found her mind automatically making her assume that only the worst could be hidden inside the hole.

No.

No! what was at the bottom didn't matter to her. If she couldn't do this then she didn't belong in Dauntless.

She closed her eyes, held her breath, and imagined she were only jumping off the roof of her house. The thought didn't help, but she leapt outward and off the ledge anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: The initiates see the inside of the Dauntless compound for the first time, and Tris has her first fight in the ring with Molly from Candor.


	4. Chapter 4

The fall must have lasted for thirty seconds, or at least that was what Beatrice felt and thought.

She wanted to scream, but with her throat constricted by fear, nothing came out but a light stream of air as she fell faster and faster.

Suddenly she was inside the dark pit, and her body hit something hard making her bounce up high into the air and fall back on to what she now knew to be a net. She let her body go limp as she lay back looking up at the blue sky above her, and smiled, wide and proud. She was the first jumper, and she didn't even scream.

Suddenly the net gave way on one end and her body rolled to the side. Not being able to catch herself, she fell off the net, and landed in the arms of a stranger.

It was dark in the pit she had fallen into, and the only light in the place where she had landed was provided by the afternoon sun overhead. Though she wasn't able to see who had caught her, she knew that it was a boy, and that he was broad shouldered and strong.

He put her down, but didn't let go of her.

"What's your name," he asked, though it felt like more of a demand than a question.

"Oh, its Bea-" she didn't let herself finish. For some reason the name just didn't go with what she felt inside. The boy who caught her seemed to be able to sense this.

"You don't have to use the name you were givin in your old faction," he said. "You can pick a new one. But be careful, you only get to choose once."

Beatrice swallowed hard before squeezing her hands into fists. "Tris," she said. "It's Tris."

The boy simply stared at her with a look of complete indifference for a long moment, and at such a close distance, Tris found that in some ways he seemed familiar.

"First jumper! Tris!" he called out, making Tris flinch. A roar from a crowd hidden in the darkness around the net brought Tris back to the present, and half of them were chanting her name. The chant went on and on, and she allowed herself to soak it all in. She felt empowered.

The screams of the second jumper grew louder as he plummeted toward the net, the boy who had caught Tris hurried her off toward a spot not far from the net. Looking up, Tris saw a flash of purple bounce up from the net and fall back down one final time. For a moment she didn't believe it, but the second jumper was Peeta.

With her eyes finally adjusting to the darkness around her, she looked back up at the boy who had caught her.

He looked older, perhaps Eric's age, but vastly more attractive. His face was clear of piercings, but the back of his neck bore the mark of a tattoo barely visible due to the black shirt he wore. Tris knew by taking one look at the stern expression on his face that he must have been a Dauntless leader, and chose to fear him rather than feel curious.

***

The rest of Tris's friends had all followed her lead and jumped into the pit one after the other. Christina was the fifth to jump, and she immediately found her way over to Tris.

The entire group of initiates had finally jumped into the black hole, and safely made their way towards a dark hallway away from the net.

"Alright listen up! My names Four, and I'll be overseeing your initiation into Dauntless since you're transfers," the man who caught Tris said.

"Four?" Christina frowned, drawing all eyes to her. She snorted before finishing her thoughts. "Four like the number?"

A dangerous calm found its way to Four's face, and he quietly stepped closer and closer to Christina until his chest was inches away from her face. For a while he just stood there, and the longer the group waited in silence, the more fear they felt as to what might happen next.

"You," Four said, his voice dangerously low. "You're from Candor. Correct?"

"Y-yes," Christina whispered back. Four hunched over a bit so that he was eye to eye with her before speaking again.

"One thing you're going to need to learn in order to survive her, is how to keep your mouth shut," he said, and after a beat, he stood up straight and turned away from Christina.

Beginning to walk down the hallway he had lead the initiates to moments before, he left the transfers alone without a word.

Tris looked over to Christina and saw that she was standing inhumanly still. Will came up from behind her and put a hand on Christina's shoulder, affectively shocking her out of her daze.

"Do you think… We should follow him?" he asked, and as if on queue all the initiates began to flow around Christina, Tris, and Will, in order to follow Four. All the initiates accept Al, Peeta, and Katniss.

"That guy, is the king of all things creepy," Christina said, and a visible shudder ran through her body.

"Yeah," Will shuttered. "You said it."

The group had wasted enough time thinking over how fear inducing their new leader Four was, and decided to run to catch up with the other initiates.

***

The group moved quickly as they maneuvered through the dark and twisting tunnel while following Four. He maintained a fast pace, but before anyone had the chance to ask where they were headed, a sliver of light at the end of the tunnel caught everyone's attention.

In a few moments, they had emerged from the tunnel, and entered into a large open area that looked to have been carved out from canyon. All of the transfers took in a collective gasp as they absorbed everything they could see within the new place.

They were at a great height, and stretched out below them were hordes of Dauntless members doing all sorts of things. Some were fighting, others eating, and some simply basking in the natural light let in by the grand looking glass ceiling overhead.

Four, who had walked over to a staircase running down the side of the stone wall, made his way back to the front of the gawking pack of kids who were seeing this part of Dauntless for the first time.

"This is The Pit," he said, and Tris could understand why it was called that. The Pit, was, well... a pit.

"This way," Four said, and the sense of wonder felt by the group was effectively crushed by his flat tone.

Leading them down the stairs and through The Pit, he cut through another dimly lit tunnel, and brought the group to an underground room with rows of tables upon tables placed throughout. The room was empty, and loosely resembled a cafeteria.

"This is where most of us eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It's bigger then it looks," Four stated, but the red and white lighting of the place made it look cramped. Tris took his word for it though, since in reality the place must have been a huge.

Not pausing any longer, Four started walking off toward the opposite end of the cafeteria room, and rounded a corner. This time, instead of entering an awe inspiring location, the group was lead into a less then appealing space with bunk beds lined up against the walls and rows of cement pillars running down the middle.

The room was long and narrow, and at its end was an open space where Tris could see toilets lining the back walls accompanied by sinks and a few mirrors.

"Each stage of training is one week long, and this," Four said, his voice a monotone void. "Is where you'll be living throughout those three weeks."

"Oh boy… Sure is charming huh?" Christina whispered as she leaned into Tris's shoulder.

Tris couldn't help but crack a smile and bite her lip as she suppressed a laugh. The living conditions were not by any means ideal, but if Christina was there with her, then maybe the next three weeks wouldn't be so bad.

***

**Two days later**

*******

Life as a Dauntless initiate was the worst.

Days had gone by, and each one was more physically gruelling than the last. This was what Eric was talking about when he said that the initiates would be tested in stages. Four said the first stage would be physical based, the second mental, and the last emotional. How the Dauntless would manage to test their initiates mental and emotional strength was beyond Tris, so she focused on building up her physical strength in order to make it past the first stage.

Coming into the training room a bit earlier than the others with Peeta, Al, and Katniss, Tris picked out a punching bag and got to work. The room seemed new, but the smell of sweat and metal clung to the place like 'white on rice' as Will described it. He wasn't entirely wrong. The only thing that made Tris worry was the raised platform in the center of the room that must have been used for fighting. With the thought of having to fight another initiate in the back of her mind, she kept training.

Tris hit her bag as hard as she could, but it didn't move half as much as Katniss' did, and not a tenth as much as Peeta or Al's did. At this point, Tris understood that she was the weakest out of her friend group of six.

Suddenly the double-door to the large training room swung open, and in walked Four with a duffle bag in hand. He paused and looked up at the four initiates as they punched and kicked, but let his eyes lingered on Tris as she punched her bag with little force. Dropping his duffle bag, he marched with purpose over to her side. Al, Peeta, and Katniss chose to continue training as Four's presence brought nothing but awkward tension to the group.

Stopping to stand beside Tris as she forced herself to pretend his eyes weren't all over her, she continued to punch the bag, harder this time as to hopefully impress Four. She seemed to be failing.

"You're forms all wrong," he said, and Tris hesitated for a moment before puling her fist back again and driving it into the punching bag.

"I think I'll be fine," she murmured.

"No, you won't be. Here," Four said as he stepped closer. Suddenly he had one hand on her stomach and another on her upper back.

"Relax your shoulders," he said. "And here. You have tokeep tension here."

Four tensed his hand over Tris's stomach as he instructed her on how to hold herself, and for some reason, Tris felt comfortable with him hovering so close to her.

She had a sudden urge to look up and into his eyes, but a strong part of her told her to keep her eyes forward. She looked over anyways, and was met with a cold stare from a man with eyes that were far too blue.

"You got that?" he asked as though he had finished the lesson, but didn't move the hand he had on her stomach.

Suddenly heat bloomed on Tris's cheeks and butterflies danced in her stomach. She cleared her throat and stepped away from him.

"Yeah. Thanks," she said, and Four took a step back as well.

"Good," he said, his face still unreadable, but his usual cold stare was in some ways warmer then Tris was used to.

Four turned away from her and walked back to the Duffle bag he dropped on his way to her.

Looking back to her friends, Tris was met with confused and dumbfounded stares. Will looked like he was about to pass out, and Tris couldn't help but smile as she shook her head and turned back to her punching bag.

Keeping tension in her mid section, she punched the bag. It swayed easily.

***

The rest of the transfer initiate group had found their way into the training room just in time for Eric to file in after them.

Walking over to Four, he leaned in close to his ear and whispered something. Four didn't look happy with whatever he just heard.

"Okay, here's where the fun starts!" announced Eric as he waved for the initiates to crowd around him.

"First jumper, Tris. In the ring! And last jumper, Molly. In the ring!" he roared, and a panic formed so suddenly in Tris that it stopped the air from getting to her lungs.

Taking a moment to catch her breath, Tris moved through the crowd of initiates and stepped up onto the raised fighting platform and into the boundaries of its red line.

Molly was quick to do as she was told, and joined Tris in the red circle before turning back to Eric for further instruction.

Tris remembered this girl. She was friends with Peter, the one Christina had called "an ass." Peter and Molly seemed to be thick as thieves from what Tris had observed over the past few days, but something about the way Molly glared at everyone around her made Tris dislike her.

"You two are our first fighters for the season," Eric stated matter-of-factly. "You're going to be ranked on this, so you better give it your all."

Tris looked over at Molly, and Molly at her. Molly didn't seem to have a tenth of the same petrifying fear in her body that Tris did, and the dull look in her eyes confirmed that belief. Suddenly, Molly turned back to face Eric.

"And how long do we fight for?" she asked, sounding bored.

Eric showed off his usual dead grin before saying, "until one of you can't continue."

"Or until one of you concedes," Four interjected, looking a little flustered.

Eric leered at him from the corner of his eye. "Those were the old rules," he said. "New rules say that no one concedes."

Tris found herself looking over at Four, and saw him mutter something under his breath making Eric tense beside him.

"Alright no more wasted time. Begin!" Eric shouted, and Molly instantly put her fists up to guard her face.

Tris did as Molly had done and put her hands up, but the stiffness in her joints made her feel off-balance and anxious. Was Eric really serious about making them fight till the other couldn't continue? Just the thought alone made her heart beat faster in her chest. It couldn't have been true, could it have?

All thoughts left Tris's mind as Molly suddenly lurched forward and threw out her fist.

Tris blocked the punch and hit the fist away with her left hand as her body moved to the right. Molly was quick to bring her arm back and resume a fighting stance.

 _"This is real. This is real. You have to fight,"_ Tris told herself as she forced the trembling in her hands to subside. There was no point in coming this far just to give in to fear now.

Suddenly Molly was on the move again, and she stepped forward and threw out another punch. This time Tris knew what to expect, and noted that Molly put to much weight behind her punches. Putting her entire body weight into blocking Molly's punch, Tris moved fast and pushed the girls arm away from her body.

Molly fell off balance as she jolted forward and nearly toppled to the ground. Tris sidestepped past her and took up her, feeling triumphant as she took up her fighting stance once more.

"Nice move Tris!" yelled a familiar voice, and Christina was the first to break the silence that had fallen over the crowd of initiates watching the fight.

Tris tore her eyes away from Molly long enough to catch Eric staring at her opponent.

"Enough playing with each other!" he shouted. "Fight!"

Molly didn't need to be told twice, and she instantly regained her lost balance and charged at Tris.

Instinctively, Tris dropped her head and stood her ground, bringing her arms up to protect her head. Molly was quick to ram into her and pull up hard on Tris's hair.

In the split second that it took Tris to yell out in pain, she raised her head just enough for Molly to jam her fist into one of Tris's eyes. The pain was intense yet numbing at the same time, and it drove Tris to elbow Molly's arm that was holding her hair and throw a punch to the girls stomach. The jab landed with a thick smacking sound, and Molly let go of Tris's hair in order to cradle her mid section.

Tris sprang to her feet and fought to ignore the pulsing pain in her right eye. Moving forward as fast as she could she pulled back her leg and went to kick Molly in the face while she was bent over, but her opponent was too fast, and she blocked her kick with two arms and lunged forward leading with her shoulder. Tris was knocked backward and fell to the ground with a painful thud.

The air in her lungs fled her body so quickly it made a pained sound scratch its way up and out of her throat. The back of her head had hit the floor after her shoulders did, making a violent crack ring through her skull. Suddenly stars danced across the ceiling as Tris lay on her back dazed, and the weight of her limbs made her think that she was close to blacking out. But she couldn't black out. That would mean she had lost.

Summoning the last of her strength Tris closed her eyes and rolled onto her stomach, not sure if a pained cry had left her body or not. And by the time she opened them, she found herself facing Eric, and watching Four as he walked away from the fight and out of the training area. For a moment Tris believed that he had wanted for her to stay in Dauntless, but that hope was dead now. He was abandoning her.

Suddenly sound rushed back into the room, and Tris found that her senses were working overtime. She could feel every punch she had endured, every gut twisting pang of fear, and the sadness of leaving her family all over again as she lay writhing in discomfort.

Pain crippled her body, and she found that she was barely able to prop herself up on one elbow as she slowly turned her upper half in order to look back at Molly.

Molly on the other hand wasn't looking at Tris. She was on her feat and seemed alert while her eyes remained trained on Eric. Something flashed in her eyes, and for the first time Tris saw emotion grace Molly's face, but as quickly as it came, it left, and Molly turned her attention back to the girl lying on the ground in front of her.

The world went quiet again as Tris's mind wandered back to her home in Abnegation and her brother Caleb. She had forgotten what his face looked like.

As she struggled to remember, the sound of thunder striking the ground near her head made her look to the side just to see Molly stepping closer and raising her leg.

Tris closed her eyes and clenched her jaw, hoping that somehow she would be able to withstand the blow.

Suddenly her entire world was nothing but pain. Her head flew to the side and her body hit the floor again.

She had no choice but to give in to the darkness pulling her to a place where nothing existed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: While Beatrice heals from her fight with Molly, Katniss and Peeta take some time to reconnect after the insanity of the first few days of Dauntless Training.
> 
> And P.S. Can I just say that I appreciate every hit and kudos I get on this fic :') It means so much to me! haha thanks so much! Love you guys and thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This chapter did not undergo my usual editing scheme, but since I most likely won't update for another while (five days or so), I decided to throw caution to the wind and upload this either way. So sorry if you find errors or awkward sentence flow while reading! In this chapter... We find some things out about Katniss that are hard to believe, and also come to realize that something bigger is at play behind the scenes from Peeta...
> 
> Thank you SO much for reading and going on this adventure with me! :) Enjoy!

Standing in the bathroom of the initiate's dormitory, Katniss begrudgingly looked into the mirror and frowned at her reflection. She fought after Tris had, and faced off against a girl named Myra who turned out not to be much competition. She must not have had aptitude for Dauntless.

Still, she had punched Katniss square in the jaw before getting tackled to the ground, and once that happened it was all over.

Katniss looked down from her bruised jaw to the red and purple blotches on her knuckles. For some reason, the sight made her remember the ordeal that was her aptitude test. Her hands began to shake.

_"Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't think about it. Don't cry,"_ she told herself as she breathed in deeply through her nose. Holding her breath, she focused her gaze on the bleak grey that where her own eyes in the mirror.

"Breathe," she told herself mentally, and all the pent up stress and tension in her body left with a simple exhale.

Suddenly something moved to her left and she jumped in surprise.

"It's just me!" Peeta yelped as he raised his hands. "I thought you heard me come in. Sorry."

Katniss hadn't noticed him, or the fact that she had brought her fists up as if she were ready to knock out whoever had scared her.

Seeing the look of caution in Peeta's eyes, she sighed heavily.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm just… Jumpy."

"Its okay. I am too. But we did well today. We really did," Peeta said, his voice tapering off at the end as if to try and keep Katniss from noticing the fear in it. She chose not to acknowledge it.

"We did do well," she agreed. "We both won our fights… But I still can't believe that you beat the Erudite boy with so few punches."

"You know he has a name," Peeta mumbled. "He's our friend, and… I feel bad about it. His names Will."

Katniss turned away from Peeta's sad eyes and back to her reflection. "He's your friend," she corrected. "Not mine. I don't want friends. I want to survive."

Peeta scoffed a little, making Katniss turn back to face him in annoyance.

"You should have thought about that before you transferred," Peeta said. "Surviving. What if. I mean what if we-"

"Don't say it. We won't get picked," Katniss interrupted. "We just have to make it through initiation and not worry about the games."

"I know I know, I get it. You just… Need to. I don't know," Peeta said, not caring enough to mask the tone of defeat in his voice.

He took a step closer, and Katniss didn't stop him.

"You know," she said. "Don't tell anyone this, but... I miss our purple."

Peeta let himself smile softly as he reached up and let his hand rest on Katniss' lower arm just above her elbow. Her skin was soft, and he was pleasantly surprised that she hadn't moved away from him yet.

"I miss it too," he said. "But I don't, miss those damn scarves."

He had meant for the scarf thing to be a joke, but Katniss didn't laugh. Instead she a serious look grew on her face, and she stepped back from him.

"We need to talk," she said, pausing to bite at her lower lip hard. "About things we promised we wouldn't talk about."

*******

Katniss and Peeta had walked back to their claimed bunk beds in silence, both knowing that the conversation ahead of them was long overdue.

Letting a sigh play in her chest before releasing it, Katniss took her hair out of the tight braid that held it in place. Her hair flowed dark and effortlessly in waves over her shoulders and down her back, and Peeta had to hold himself back from reaching out and running a hand through it.

"You know, you look just as good with your hair down as you do with it up," he said, and though he meant it as a compliment, Katniss scowled at him.

"We aren't here to talk about my hair," she said.

"Right, I know. Sorry," Peeta whispered, making Katniss instantly regret her harshness towards him. Shaking her head slightly, she focused on the thing she had wanted to ask Peeta since they had first spilled their blood in the Dauntless bowl.

"Why did you do it?" she asked, and Peeta was confused.

"Do what?"

"Transfer," she said coldly, and Peeta winced as if she had cut him.

"Are you really that surprised? Our old faction's manifesto said-"

"Don't you dare play that game with me Peeta! Why did you leave everything behind? I just don't get it-"

"Do you think I had a life back there? I had nothing!" he yelled, and the red in his cheeks mimicked the red in Katniss'.

After a moment of stunned silence, Peeta cleared his throat.

"Katniss…" he said, giving in to the soft memories of childhood with the dark haired girl sitting on the bunk across from him. "We've been friends since first grade… Do you think… Do you honestly think that after everything we've been through, that I would let you go through something like this alone? If the roles were reversed, would you transfer with me?"

Katniss said nothing, only staring into the eyes of a boy who must have loved her so much that he would throw his entire world into a gutter just to stay close to her. In that moment, she could only feel a cold emptiness that was now slowly growing inside her.

"I would," she whispered softly after a long while. "I would have done the same thing."

Peeta couldn't have hid the smile that grew on his face even if he tried, and Katniss found the grin infectious as she started smiling too.

"Okay, this is nice and all, but we have something else to worry about," Katniss said, effortlessly crushing the warmth that began circulating between herself and Peeta.

"I know," Peeta sighed. "I'm worried about that too. But I want you to know that-"

"Don't even think about that possibility," Katniss snapped. She didn't want to think about Peeta and the hunger games in the same space. "We still have almost an entire month till then."

Peeta shook his head as if reading her thoughts. "Katniss, if I get picked-"

"You wont."

"But if I do-"

"You wont!" she yelled, and Peeta closed his mouth as he dropped his gaze to the floor.

A moment of silence passed, and Peeta wanted nothing more than to fill it with heartfelt words, so he tried again.

"But if I do…" he whispered, and looked up and into Katniss' eyes. "I don't want you to come with me."

"Oh, that's great. So you can risk your life and transfer to the most dangerous faction we have just to stay with me, but I can't risk my life to go with you?"

"This is completely different."

"How? People could die during initiation alone. Tris and Will are comatose right now."

"Just promise me that if you don't get picked and I do that you won't come with me."

"Why is that such a big deal to you?"

"Excuse me?"

"Peeta why is my life so damn important to you!?"

"Because!" he yelled, and it was the first time Katniss had ever seen him this angry and upset. "This isn't like any normal games!"

Katniss sat in silence for a moment as she stared wide-eyed at the boy who rarely glared at someone let alone yell.

"You know why _that_ is a more dangerous thing now than it's ever been before," he said, and it was now her turn to look at the floor.

_"That…"_ Peeta continued in a low voice. "Is all that matters now. Katniss… Coming here was a mistake for you. I couldn't just… Let you go alone."

Katniss couldn't find the right words to use as she swallowed back her emotions and looked up. The only thing she wanted was to not see tears in Peeta's eyes when she looked in to them. "I know," she said. "I know…"

"Katniss if you go into the games…" Peeta began, but he didn't need to finish his thoughts, Katniss already knew what he was going to say.

"The whole world will know… That I'm _divergent,_ " she finished, and the silence that followed felt thick and tangible.

The word felt heavy, and she whispered it as if simply saying it would bring the ceiling down upon her and Peeta.

"Katniss we can't forget what Gale told us. We can't forget that there's something wrong with the games."  
"Of course. You know, other than the fact that we have kids murdering each other in cold blood."

"You know what I mean…"

"I do," Katniss said.

Peeta lowered his voice further as he leaned in closer to Katniss.

"Katniss… If what Gale thinks is right, you can't go into the games. There's no way you'd survive, but that's not the worst part-"

"The worst part is the panic that's going to surface once everyone learns that a divergent was born."

"Right," Peeta sighed as he combed a hand through his hair. "Erudite and Stalwart might be covering up something big. We can't ignore Gales warning. This games could… They could be hunting-"

The door to the dorm room suddenly cut off Peeta's sentence midway as it swung open loudly. A beat up looking Will and a breathless Christina came barreling in, laughing robustly about something that had them both in stiches.

"Hunting what?" Will asked, and both Peeta and Katniss froze.

Christina scrunched up her nose the way she did when she suspected someone of withholding information from her. "What were you guys talking about? Who's hunting what exactly?"

"The Amity," Katniss said, thinking up a lie as fast as she could. "We're talking about their farms, whether or not they do more then raise live stock. Think they hunt things?"

Peeta gave Katniss a grateful look. She sure saved the day. If word got out of what Gale suspected Erudite and Stalwart of doing, then all the initiate kids no matter what faction were as good as dead.

"Oh please," laughed Christina. "They wouldn't know the difference between a gun and a pencil."

Katniss forced out a light giggle as she nodded her head. "Yeah, I think you're right. See Peeta? I told you!"

"Alright fine! You win this one," he laughed, and Will and Christina walked to their bunks beside Katniss and Peeta and sat down. The tension between Peeta and Katniss had dissipated, but questions still remained and things still needed to be said. They made a silent promise to each other to pick up where they left off as soon as they could, but with Will and Christina's inevitable hilarity, that moment could take a while to arrive.

Shortly after, Tris walked in supported by Al as she yawned hard. Seeing that the rest of her friend group had already gotten together, her and Al made their way to the beds across from them. Will noted that this was the first time their group had been together and alone since the beginning of initiation.

"Whoa! This is a rare moment, you realize that right?" he announced. "Everyone's still eating lunch, and we've never had a room to ourselves before. We should do something."

"Like what? Play spin-the-bottle?" Christina asked jokingly, and Will shook his head.

"Oh I don't know, you decide then," he said, and that was all Christina needed to start off on a rant that was completely unrelated to what Will had actually asked her to do.

Soon after, Peeta was laughing, and joined in with the conversation. Then Al, who still had an arm around Tris's shoulders, found himself wrapped up in the now violent debate as to whether touching your tongue to your nose was a talent. Christina of course could do it, and Will could not.

"Hey, how are you?" Katniss asked Tris in a low voice as the others went on with their own debate.

"Fine," she said. "I'm okay. Just, uh. Just shaken. How about you?"

Katniss bit her lip and shook her head as she remembered Myra's blood on her knuckles. Making herself smile a little, she answered. "I'm fine too. But you know, I'm pretty sure Myra got a good punch in to my chest."

"Ouch," Will winced as he noted what Katniss had said. "Boob shot."

No one expected for him to say that, and none of them could help but laugh. Even Katniss who hadn't shown a sincere smile since her aptitude test found herself genuinely lighting up at the stupid joke. Or was that even considered a joke?

"Are you kidding me?" Christina said suddenly. "How old are we? We just laugh at the word boob or what?"

"Well we all need a good laugh now and then right?" Al said, and the arm he had around Tris tensed slightly, making her smell the fresh rosemary and sage that always seemed to follow him around.

"Too true Albert too true," Will said with a smile. "If we couldn't laugh, we would all go insane with worrying about the hunger games and the possibility of becoming factionless some time this month."

The words came out soft, but his cold, Erudite roots made the fact scream itself into the groups minds clear as day. They had been laughing too hard at dumb jokes, and smiling too wide at the enjoyment of each others company, but the underlying fear that they might one day have to kill each other never went away. They all needed distractions, but Will just burst the bubble that kept them away from the horrified thoughts of an impending reality.

Peeta was the first to break the silence, and Katniss was grateful for it.

"Will," he said. "Has anyone ever told you that you're the funniest person ever without even trying?"

His question lessened the feeling of doom being shared within the group. Will shook his head as if to say no.

"Most people just think I'm annoying," he replied, nodding his head in Christina's direction.

"I'm not even going to deny that one," she said, and for the first time in a long time, all stress genuinely seeped out of the room.

*******

Kids had begun to come back from their lunch break, and soon the last round of fights for the day would be underway. Katniss, Peeta, Tris, and Will had already fought, and the only one left was Christina. Of course, they would all have to go back to the training room to support her.

The light-hearted and warm conversation surged on even as more and more initiates with deep bruises and cut faces made their way into the room.

Al kept an arm around Tris, making sure every so often that she wasn't in too much pain or any sort of discomfort. His concern for her felt genuine, and the warmth that he brought to her body was welcomed in every way. Still, the feeling that there may have been something deeper behind Al's kindness towards her never left her mind, and though she would never admit it to herself, Tris hoped that he wouldn't allow any romantic feelings for her to grow.

They were all relaxed, accept for Christina who put on a brave face but still chewed at the ends of her nails every once in a while. The only ones who seemed to notice were Katniss and Peeta.

After a rather enthusiastic rant from Will about how complicated the English language was – which Peeta couldn't understand – Peeta turned his attention to Christina as he thought of a way to ease the tension in her mind.

"Guys, English is fascinating and all-" Peeta grimaced, making Tris perk up. She noted gratefully that she wasn't the only one that thought that Will often got carried away with his lessons. "-But I think its time that, uh. We make this official. Like you know, do something that only we would recognize. Like give this group a name or something."

Katniss looked over at Peeta and held herself back from pulling him into a sideways hug. She knew what he was doing, and the distraction was sure to pull Christina back from the fear of her impending fight. Peeta always was and forever would be the most Amity person she had ever met, and that wasn't a bad thing.

The group exchanged quizzical looks, not knowing whether to go with Peeta's idea and blurt out a suggestions or wait for him to continue.

Al was the first to speak.

"Well…" he began with a smile, letting his teeth show for the first time. "What should we call ourselves?"

Suddenly Christina smiled, and Katniss could practically feel Peeta's pride at his accomplishment.

"How bout…" Christina began. "The Exterminators."

Will scoffed in response. "Yeah, sounds great, lets go around killing bugs instead of passing initiation huh?"

"Oh shut it!" Christina laughed, and she playfully poked Will's ribcage with her elbow. Suddenly, Katniss noticed something more behind Will and Christina's usual banter. Were there mutual feelings for something more there? She wasn't too sure.

"How about, uh… Oh! How about The Careers?" said Peeta. "Back in Stalwart, we called the Dauntless 'careers' since they do everything so intensely like its their job. Get it?"

Katniss gave him a look, since she knew that that wasn't why the Dauntless were called "careers" back in Stalwart, but she kept quiet. She didn't want the others to know that it was actually because they win the hunger games every year like 'its their job.'

The group bickered on for a few moments before something came to Tris's mind. It was a simple name, but simple was all she really ever knew.

"How about 'The Six'," she blurted out over the murmurs that were her friends conversation.

"The Six?" said Will, testing out the name. "I don't know. Sort of boring."

"No," Katniss said as she sat up straighter. "I like it. Its simple, and to the point."

"Well then I'm all for it," Peeta said as he smiled at Katniss. "There are six of us right?"

"I'm with Peeta and Tris," Al announced as he gently squeezed Tris's shoulder.

Christina and Will rolled their eyes.

"Of _course_ you guys would go for a plain name," Christina smiled. "I still think that 'The Exterminators' is way more kick ass."

A commutative acceptance for the title of The Six made Tris feel something that she had never truly felt in her life. She felt as though she belonged.

The underlying thought of the hunger games of course found its way into the group as it always did when they were together. Thinking about having to kill the others… it was enough to drive them insane. But with this new and symbolic tie that they shared, an unspoken vow to stay with each other till the end passed between them. If they were to be reaped and enter into the hunger games, they would stick together.

They would act as a single unit for as long as they could, since they all needed support. That was just how the bond of The Six would work. But they each had secrets that they the others could never find out, and sooner than they expected, those secrets would bubble to the surface.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: The initiates are taught how to throw knives, and Tris finds herself in a horrifying situation. Afterword, Four and Tris have a talk.


	6. Chapter 6

"Up! Everybody up!" a voice yelled. The lights to the dormitory buzzed to life, and there stood Eric at the entrance of the room with Four and one other female Dauntless leader behind him.

The initiates were startled, but immediately began to sit up in bed and put on their combat boots.

Groggily, Tris turned to Christina in the bunk next to her. "Ugh… What time is it?" she asked.

Looking up at the analogue clock at the back of the room, Christina rubbed her eyes and stood. "5:00 AM," she murmured, obviously still in a sleepy daze.

Tris pursed her lips in annoyance. "Perfect."

***

Today was not a day of practicing simple fighting stances or learning to shoot guns as Tris had hoped, but instead, it was one of the 'tough days' as the initiates liked to call them. A 'tough day' was a day meant to push you to your physical limits and test your body while under extreme distress. For Tris, it was a grueling thing, and left her breathless and aching from the five AM jog alone. The entire transfer initiate pack had been jogging at a steady pace for at least forty minutes, and though Tris wanted to give up ten minutes in, she kept running.

A sudden thudding sound at the head of the pack made Tris look up, and she saw the crowd of runners split down the middle as water would weave around a rock in a stream. Once she reached the spot of divergence, she understood why everyone had moved aside. Molly had fallen over.

Tris remembered back to her old life in Abnegation as she considered helping Molly to her feet, but thought better of it as she ran past her. Sparing a quick glance over her shoulder, she saw the girl stand, shake off whatever pain she was feeling, and sprint to catch up with the rest of the pack.

"You know what? Seeing her. Fall. Makes me. Feel. Good about myself," smiled Christina between heavy huffs of breathe.

Tris smiled back and nodded her head in agreement. Molly was a big girl. Broad and strong and intimidating in all the ways a sixteen-year-old Dauntless girl should be, and seeing her fall only made Tris feel one step closer to passing initiation.

She decided then that the only thing holding her back from her goals was herself.

***

A mere hour later – with a small five-minute break at the halfway mark – the jog was over, and the initiates broke for lunch. They enjoyed a quick meal before being instructed to enter the training room, and a pit of anxiety began to grow in Tris's stomach. What would Eric and Four have them do next?

As they walked into the room the same way they had a thousand times before, everyone noticed that something was different. Instead of all the lights being on inside the room, only a select few were shining down from the ceiling, highlighting a long table with knives strewn across its surface at one end. And at the other end of the table lay what looked to be some leg holsters for the knives folded neatly in rows. Close to the table of knives at the end of the training room, was an equally long row of thick, flat, plastic, human shaped targets that seemed to be built into the wall.

Tris was stunned, and knew exactly what they were going to do. Before she could help it, she let a small gasp escape her mouth and forced herself to stand taller in order to get a clearer view of the new training room set up.

"Hey," whispered a boy to her left. When she looked over, she saw that it was Peeta. "You okay?"

"Yes," she whispered back. "Actually, I feel amazing."

"Why?"

"Because we're about to learn how to throw knives."

"Oh… That's a good thing then?"

"In Abnegation, my mother taught me and my brother how to throw knives," she said, and Peeta frowned as he turned his gaze back to the scattered knives on the table across the room. His parents wouldn't have dared to give him any sort of training, so he wouldn't know where to start. They told him that if he left Stalwart he deserved to suffer. And oh… If only they knew what he was going through now.

"Alright no more standing around," shouted Eric as he clapped his hands together. "For the next five minutes you'll be taught how to properly throw a knife, and after that, you have an hour to practice, then it's a quick five K jog and more intense physical training."

No initiate dared to let a sign of discomfort show at the mention of the five-kilometer jog, but inwardly, each of them was screaming.

As Four worked his way past the crowd of initiates situated at the entrance to the training room, Eric gave him a shrewd smile, and spoke again.

"Four will be you're instructor," he said. "Let's get started."

***

Everyone was standing in a semi-circle in front of the center target along the wall, and an atmosphere of excitement grew inside the room as Four stepped up to the target the initiates gathered around.

"Okay, everyone listen up!" he shouted, his voice clear and confident as he directed all attention onto himself, and Tris found herself not wanting to look at him for too long for some reason.

"These targets are special in three ways," he continued as he roughly slapped a hand on the surface of the target.

"The first being that they tell you how fast you threw your knife," he said, pointing to a black panel built into the wall about a meter directly over the target. He then began to leisurely walk away from the target and toward the knife table.

"The second thing is that they give you a score from zero, being the absolute worst, to six, being the absolute best, after you throw. This score determines how good the throw actually was."

Four had now reached the table and was examining the selection of knives. Bending forward, he grabbed a knife holster, clipped it to his right leg, and gracefully picked up three knives.

"Wait," said Will, and more then a few initiates gave him annoyed looks. "What does it score you on?"

Instead of looking stern and inconvenienced as Tris expected him to, Four gave Will a slight nod before answering his question.

"It takes three things into account. The speed at which you threw the knife, the place you hit on the target in accordance to how much damage it would do to a living person, and how hard of an impact you made."

"Fascinating," Will said, clearly mesmerized by the technological aspects of Dauntless training. Christina rolled her eyes before subtly clearing her throat and elbowing him in the side.

"Don't get too excited," Four scowled. "Only six people have ever gotten a perfect score, and only one got three in a row. I doubt any of you could score higher then a four."

"Well who got the three perfects in a row?" asked Peter as he stepped forward.

"Me," Four said firmly, and Tris may have been the only initiate who wasn't surprised.

"You said that the targets were special because of three things," said Peeta. "You've only told us of two. Right?"

He was standing behind Tris, and his voice surprised her. Peeta was never one to speak without first being spoken to. Four frowned at him for a moment, then scoffed while letting a smirk play on his lips.

"The third thing that makes them special is that they don't move, so transfers like you actually have a chance of hitting them," he barked, and Peter stifled a laugh as he stared at Peeta. "Now everyone grab a holster and four knives."

No one had to be told twice, and Al, Christina, Tris, and Will all went to grab four throwing knives and a holster from the table. Tris took note of the fact that Katniss hadn't followed behind them and instead stood a distance away from herself and the others in the semi-circle. Peeta of course was glued to her.

As the initiates settled back into their semi-circle, Four stood in front of the middle target, and backed up till he was about eight meters away from it. He then lined himself up with the target and began explaining the proper stance one should have when throwing a knife from a stand still, and Tris found the process fascinating yet familiar. Her mother had taught her nearly the same way. And then Four threw his first knife, and the group fell silent as the blade hit the target in the shoulder and stuck.

A second after the initial throw, the black panel above the target light up with red dots, spelling out the number forty-one.

"I threw the knife at forty-one miles-per-hour," Four said. "And in a second, the target will tell me the overall effectiveness of my throw."

A long moment of anticipation passed, and a small beep played from the panel as a big two displayed itself next to the forty-one.

"As you can see, I scored a two. Most likely because a live person could keep fighting after I hit their shoulder, and my speed didn't add up to a forceful impact," Four explained, and even Tris found herself wondering what made the target tick as Will had.

Four turned his attention away from the initiates and back to the target. Lining himself up one more time, he stood a little differently, and threw the knife harder than before.

This time, the blade moved much faster, and to track its movements through the air was nearly impossible, and in the blink of an eye the knife buried itself in the targets flat belly.

Tris couldn't help but gasp as she imagined the target to be a real person rather than plastic, and quickly composed herself as she shook the thoughts of the hunger games out of her head. Another gasp from Christina made Tris look up, and she saw that the number above the target read seventy-three.

"Damn," Christina whispered.

"Damn is right," Will whispered back.

Four was back to explaining things to the initiates before his score was broadcasted.

"This time," he said. "I threw it harder, and hit a more vital area. I should receive a higher score."

Four was right, and in a moment the familiar soft beep played out through the panel and beside the eighty-one was a big four.

"Now, don't get discouraged if you can't get a two within your first dozen throws," he said. "This isn't easy, and takes practice, in fact, throwing over a forty-five and staying accurate is difficult. The chances that you will even score higher then three is low to begin with. That's all I have to say, you're free to begin training now."

"Seriously?" shouted a voice from behind the initiates, and Four's usual somber expression shifted to an even darker one. Eric stood behind the initiate pack smirking down at Four the way he always did as he slowly began to walk forward.

"Why don't you show them what you can really do?" he said in amusement, and with slight hesitation, Four shrugged and turned back to face the target.

He stood as a person would when idly brushing their teeth or watering flowers, and his relaxed posture made Tris wonder if he was going to just stand there and do nothing in order to spite Eric. But then his shoulder twitched. He then lunged forward with his left foot and hurled the knife in his right hand over his head in a windmill motion and followed through toward the target.

One moment ago, Four was standing still. The next, the blade was in his hand and then half a second later it was gone. It all happened so fast, and before Tris could figure out whether he actually threw the knife or not, she found herself staring at the target in front of Four. The blade he threw was buried deep inside of the targets head, right between where the eyes would be.

The panel above the target read ninety-seven.

A small beep sounded, and a large six buzzed into existence.

Everyones mouths dropped as Four composed himself and looked back at Eric.

"And that folks," Eric said, clapping his hands dramatically as if to praise Four. "Is how you score a six."

***

After the shock of seeing Four completely obliterate the target before him, the initiates formed a long horizontal line standing shoulder to shoulder with one another. After spacing out slightly, they each lined up perfectly with a target.

After reflecting on Four's lesson on how to properly throw a knife, they all began to eye their targets warily. No one truly wanted to be the first to throw, since the risk of embarrassment was too great, especially after seeing Four score a six.

Katniss had not followed behind Tris and the group as they found places in the line, and instead found a spot far away from them near the end of the initiate line. Peeta, of course, followed her, even though Al and Will gave him confused looks.

Tris watched as Katniss examined the knife in her hand as she turned it over and over again, obviously evaluating its weight and feel in her palm. She looked to be a seasoned professional at the art of knife throwing judging by the way she held the thing. And just as Eric shouted for the hour of practice to begin, Katniss threw her arm back, lunged forward with her left leg as Four had, and grunted as she hurled her blade at the target before her.

It struck the target in a flash, dead center, and the force with which she threw the knife left a loud thumping sound vibrating through the air.

The black panel above Katniss' target lit up, and Eric was the first to speak.

"An eighty-one MPH throw!" he shouted as he read the speedometer above Katniss' target. "Not bad at all."

"Not bad," Four scoffed. "I think she beat your first throw."

Four's jab at Eric's ego didn't produce any sort of reaction from him, and instead, Eric simply waited for Katniss' final score to appear. The room was completely silent, and then the number six popped up in big, bright red lighting next to the eighty-one on Katniss' score bored.

A scientifically verified perfect throw.

Katniss with a knife was now a lethal combination.

"Oh… my God," breathed Christina. Her eye's glued to the knife protruding from the place where a human's heart would be on Katniss' target.

Tris suddenly found her heart beating faster as she forced herself to look away from the first thrown knife and back at the girl who threw it.

Katniss, as always, was a stoic beauty. Full of some unshared wisdom regarding the ways of combat and gamine style. And all too suddenly Tris felt shame at not noticing the girl's fierce aura sooner.

Tris looked over to Eric, and found that Four was leaning in close to his ear as he whispered something that made the latter stifle a small smile and nod. Tris could sense that they were talking about Katniss and her potential. And then, another epiphany hit her. From the beginning, her and Katniss had never been close. This girl could be her biggest competition, and as her father once told her, she should keep her "friends close and her enemies closer". Seeing Katniss strike the target with perfect accuracy and form made Tris feel shamefully jealous. She couldn't let the distance between her and Katniss become to great, or else this potential friend could transform into powerful enemy.

"A six on her first throw. Huh. We should call her 'One' eh Four. Only took her one try to get a six after all, and it took you. What… Five?" Eric mused, but Four didn't smile.

"Never thought a Stalwart girl could amount to much in Dauntless," Four said, but his cold words had no affect on Katniss. Tris could tell from the way that she was holding herself, that Katniss was proud of being able to throw a knife the way she could.

Only a few moments had passed since Katniss had thrown her knife, and a few other initiates where now preparing for their first throw. Every initiate in the room was now reevaluating their view of the quiet girl from the purple faction, and that scared Tris for some reason. She watched as Katniss pulled her second knife from its holster on her right leg, and instead of watching her throw it, Tris squared herself up with her own target. Forgetting about the world around her and ignoring Katniss' wind up to throw her second knife, Tris focused, and threw her own blade hard and with determination.

She had done this before, and estimated three turns in the air before it would hit the target. She was right, and in a moment of complete and utter anxiety over whether or not the blade would stick, a satisfying thud rang through the air, and the knife dug deep into the targets head, just shy of the exact place where Four had scored his six.

Though Tris's blade didn't make the same loud clap that Katniss' had, everyone noticed the now familiar sound of metal meeting plastic, and turned to see Tris's target impaled.

"A sixty-one MPH," said Four, "A weak throw."

Four's words hurt Tris, but the same hurt was soothed by memories of her old life. She let herself breathe, and thought back to her mother and the moment she first placed a double edged throwing knife in her hand. "Now be careful Beatrice," she said. "This isn't a toy. But if you can learn to use this, you won't have to feel scared about anything."

Tris found herself smiling as she remembered her mothers soft voice in her head, and felt a pang of hurt flick at her heart. Pushing the feeling down, she looked first at Eric and Four – who had their eyes glued to the skewered head of her target –, and then to Katniss. She found her grey eyes in an instant, but was shocked as she found the girl giving her a small smile instead of a scowl.

"Five," said Four, and Tris looked back to the panel above her target. A head shot, she thought, was an assured six, but she was too weak to meet the impact standard necessary for a six.

Thinking about the number six, Tris turned back to face Katniss. This was it. This was the turning point in their relationship. Though they had already made a somewhat pledge to stay true to each other as The Six should, the two of them never really clicked. But this, Tris thought to herself, brought Katniss and herself to equal grounds. This was a good thing. They would both be seen as strong competitors, even though Tris had lost her first fight.

Suddenly, everyone was throwing their knives. Trying again and again to get a single good stick as the first two girls had, but failing. Katniss gave Tris a small nod, and Tris reciprocated with a tightlipped smile. Perhaps the girls had more in common with each other then they had first thought.

"Okay how'd you learn to throw like that?" asked Christina to Tris's right.

"Oh. My, um. My mother taught me and my brother how to throw knives," she replied softly. "We were really young when we started. It's sort of like… Second nature or something at this point."

"Who would have thought!" shouted Will as he smiled at Tris. "Abnegation kids knew what they were doing this whole time!"

"Ha ha," Tris laughed shrewdly, and she then turned back to her target.

"H-hey," said Al as he looked over at Tris through Will and Christina who were between them. "That was really impressive. Good job. I mean, I wish I could do that."

And there it was, Al's bashful admiration for Tris rising to the surface of his quiet self once again. Tris couldn't help but give him a small, sympathetic smile before responding.

"Just practice Al," she said. "You haven't even thrown you're first one. You can do it."

He smiled back at her in his usual subtle and soft way, and turned back to his target. Al squared his body up to the target as he saw Four do. Then he pulled back his arm, and threw the knife hard. It didn't hit the target, and bounced off the wall behind it.

***

The sound of knives whipping through open air and the odd clang or click was all anyone could hear in the training room. Half an hour had passed, and both Tris and Katniss continued to stick knife after knife into various parts of their targets while others rarely got a good stick.

Peeta, to Katniss' surprise, was already picking up how to throw a knife. He had always been a fast learner, but she never knew just how fast until now.

Christina on Tris's right also showed signs of improvement as she got three knives to stick in a row, though not in vital spots on the target. Will who was on Christina's right was doing slightly better than her, but was nowhere near the current top-of-the-class knife throwers being Katniss and Tris.

Al on the other hand had yet to make one of his blades stick for longer then three seconds. Tris thought to herself that it was good that he was at least hitting the target. But then Eric began inspecting the initiates one by one, starting at the far end of the line with Katniss. She threw her knife effortlessly, not really caring where it landed, and scored a five. Then Eric moved on to Peeta, then Molly, then Peter, and before she knew it, Tris found herself under the intense scrutiny of her Dauntless leaders gaze. She took in a deep breath, aimed carefully, and threw her knife with confidence.

It struck the target the same way Katniss' first blade had. A bulls-eye, right in the center of the targets chest, and Eric nodded his head before moving onto Christina. The feeling of accomplishment at possibly impressing Eric almost made Tris's cheeks go rosy. And suddenly, Tris found herself hoping that Four was watching her throw as well.

In the midst of trying to figure out why she wanted Four to have seen her throw, Tris didn't notice Eric accept Christina's nearly botched throw – as it hit the target but didn't stick – and move onto Will who he also nodded at as he successfully hit the target. And then Eric reached Al, and under his frightening stare the boy squirmed uncomfortably before gripping the tip of his next knife crudely and pulling his arm back to throw it.

Tris had finally shaken the intrusive thought of Four and the feel of his hand on her back from her mind, and had turned to see Al wind up to throw his knife. His stance was all wrong, and his red cheeks gave away the fact that he was scared breathless of Eric's judgment. Tris wanted to say something in order to stop Al from throwing the knife, as she could tell that it would not stick, but before she could Al let his blade fly.

***

The knife didn't touch the target, or even the wall behind it for that matter, but instead flopped unceremoniously onto the ground in front of the target. It clanged hard against the concrete floor, leaving a small chip that made Al clamp his eyes shut and hold his breath.

"Oh no," Tris thought to herself. "What will Eric do?"

When Al opened his eyes, he first looked over at Tris with a grim expression on his face. Tris didn't move, but instead stared back with wide eyes as she looked away from him and back to Eric who still hadn't moved yet.

"What… Was that initiate?" asked Eric in an annoyed tone. "That must have been a joke."

Al swallowed hard before looking at the ground and turning his shoulders slightly to noncommittally face Eric.

"It… I didn't have a good grip…" he murmured.

"What was that? Speak up!" Eric shouted, and everyone turned to watch Eric reprimand Al for his horrible throw. Taking in a stabilizing breath, Al turned fully to face Eric.

"It slipped," he said, and the look on Eric's face was a fusion of disbelief, disappointment, and disapproval. Quite a hefty mixture.

"Go grab the knife," said Eric, his face now deadpan.

"Wh-what?" Al stammered.

"Go get the knife initiate."

"But- the others are still throwing."

"Did I stutter initiate? Go. Grab. The Knife!" Eric shouted, each word being a firm staccato.

Al stiffened, and turned away from Eric as if to do as he was told, but then turned back sheepishly as his cheeks grew an even deeper shade of red.

"But people are still throwing," he all but whispered. Eric's features gave way to a look of pure irritation, and Tris knew then and there that Al was screwed.

"Everyone stop!" he shouted, and the initiates obeyed. "You. Go stand in front of one of the target."

Al looked as though he were about to feint, and all the colour that once flooded his cheeks drained away, leaving him pale and sickly looking.

Before moving a muscle, he looked over at Tris with a terror in his eyes. She could practically feel Al's fear.

Tris took in a shaky breath before nodding subtly with her head in the direction of the middle target, hoping that Al would listen to her and move his frozen limbs. He had to move. If he didn't, Eric would do something horrible to him. She couldn't let that happen. Not to the boy that cared for her so deeply after she had been knocked unconscious.

Al's facial expression turned from a deadpan mask to a frightened and teary twelve-year-old in less then a second, and he turned and began to walk toward the center target against the wall. How could a sixteen-year-old who looked to be a grown man somehow transform into this shaking, errant child?

"Four?" Eric said. "Can you give me a hand with this?"

Four, who had been coolly watching the interaction between Eric and Al, stepped away from the pillar he was leaning against behind the initiates. As if already knowing what Eric wanted, he made his way to the table with knives scattered across it, and picked up four. After swiftly placing the blades in his leg holster, he made his way to Eric's side. The tension between the two was obvious, and as Four spared Tris a sideways glance, her mouth went dry and her stomach flipped. Was he challenging her? And if so, then to what?

"Here are the rules," Eric said calmly to Al. "Four here is going to throw knives at you. If I see you flinch, you're out of Dauntless. If you can stay still for all four throws, you remain an initiate, and I'll forget about your cowardice."

Tris's mouth dropped open as a breath caught in her throat. Al couldn't do it. Al would never make it! She had to do something, she had to stop this. Al was too important, too kind, too gentle to be damned the way Eric wanted him to be. And as Tris began weighing her options, she saw Will and Christina giving her odd looks.

She wanted to ask what they were doing, but then she realized that they were trying to warn her not to interfere. Of course she couldn't stop Eric or Four. They were Dauntless leaders, what could she do? They would have her killed for talking out of turn, or worse.

Tris looked back to Al and saw the pained expression on his face, and something deep inside her broke. The threat of crying suddenly became all too real.

Four let a light sigh leave his chest as if the whole ordeal was horrifyingly boring, and his lack of shame toward not caring about the life of a transfer made Tris's blood boil. Moving slowly, Four made his way to stand in front of Al. They were a good ten meters apart from each other, and Tris couldn't help but wonder how Four could choose where his knives went at such a distance. He would kill Al, surely. If not on purpose then by mistake.

A sudden movement far off to her left made Tris look away from the bored looking Four and his trembling target. Peeta had gone to do something, but Katniss had stopped him.

_"Oh no. Not him,"_ Tris thought to herself. Peeta would sacrifice himself in order to let Al walk free.

Tris couldn't let that happen. She couldn't watch two of her friends possibly get stabbed to death by airborne knives. Realizing how ridiculous the entire situation was almost made her smile, but she suppressed it and instead let a small puff of air force itself through her nose as she pushed down a hysterical laugh.

Tris looked back to Peeta, and saw him open his mouth in order to shout something as Four pulled back his arm to throw the blade. Before she could stop herself, Tris spoke.

"Stop," she said, and all eyes turned to her. Suddenly this didn't feel like a good idea.

What had she done? Four had turned from Al so quickly it looked as though his head might break off his body, and the anger in Eric's eyes made Tris's chest constrict and her knees wobble. She needed to be quiet. She needed to shut up and-

"It doesn't prove anything," she said, surprising herself at how much conviction she found in her voice. "Anyone can stand in front of a target. It doesn't prove that he's brave."

Eric's jaw flexed for a moment, and with his face an emotionless canvas, Tris assumed that he was more than livid with her. But instead of lashing out, he smiled, and the grin made a chill run up her spine.

_"Well…"_ he smirked. "Then it won't be difficult for you to take his place."

***

The room was spinning, but her body was moving on its own. Guiding her with lithesome focus to a shocked looking Al.

"What are you doing?" he whispered as Tris found herself standing in front of him. She never realized how tall he was till she was standing with her nose lined up with his chest.

"Go," she whispered back.

"No," he snapped. "You can't do this, you'll-"

"Go, Al. Now," Tris interrupted, and Al nearly jumped at her change of tone.

Looking away from Tris and at Eric and Four, Al took in a deep, slow breath, closed his eyes, and walked away from the target and back to stand beside Will.

Tris turned, and the room turned with her, swaying and bending in odd ways. For a moment, Tris let the room spin. She let herself be horrified of possibly being stabbed or thrown out of Dauntless. But as hard hitting as the fear was, her will to overcome Eric and Four's hold on herself and her friends made it easy to suppress the shaking of her body.

She was calm now. She had to be. Because if she wasn't, both her and Al might become factionless.

"Same rules apply," snapped Eric, and Four's knife wielding hand twitched.

_"Don't flinch don't flinch don't flinch,"_ Tris repeated to herself, and as Four pulled back his arm, she forced herself to keep her eyes on his.

Before she could calm herself, Four's arm swung downward, and a whistling sound shrieked through the air as his blade darted toward her mid section, but stuck hard into the target right between her knees. She hadn't flinched.

"Eighty-eight miles," announced Eric, and all the initiates gasped. None of the kids had thrown faster then a forty-three and made it stick other then Katniss and Tris. Four didn't drop his gaze from her eyes, and Tris wasn't willing to look away either. This was a power game now. If she looked away, she was submitting, and she wouldn't let herself become a coward as Four and Eric wanted.

The black panel above Tris beeped, and Eric scoffed.

"Come on Four, a three?" he smirked. "You can get a better score then that."

This made Four grind his teeth together for a moment before swallowing back whatever he wanted to say. Instead of ignoring Eric, he smirked, and Tris couldn't have been more afraid. The look on his face made her want to punch him hard.

"Sure you don't want to give up stiff?" he mocked. "I'm sure you and your friend could go back to your families if you dropped out."

Tris didn't respond, and only glared harder at Four as she willed herself not to show any fear. _"Don't… Flinch!"_

Suddenly Four's throwing arm was up in the air again, and Tris stiffened. He leaned forward and threw another knife.

It snapped forward, and buried itself a hairs length away from Tris's left shoulder.

"Ninety-five," said Eric.

Then Four's arm was up again, and another knife sailed through the air. It stabbed the target just about Tris's head, and wind from the flying blade made the hair around her face flow backward.

"Ninety-nine!" announced Eric, and all the initiates were in awe. Tris however, was anything but awe-inspired by Four's show of brutality. _"Only one more knife. Just one more. Don't. flinch!"_

"You can get closer then that," mused Eric as a soft beep rang out from the panel above Tris. Suddenly she found herself looking at the expressions on her friends faces, and each of them looked as though they were about to vomit.

Suddenly Four was positioning himself to throw another knife, and Tris felt tears well in her eyes as the adrenaline coursing through her made her legs shake and the task of breathing difficult.

"I just scored a five stiff," he said. "This next ones going to be a six, and you've seen me throw a six."

"Just throw it," Tris said through gritted teeth, surprising herself with her own words, and suddenly the entire class of initiates were gasping and holding back grins of amusement.

Eric however, looked anything but pleased. And as for Four… His face was unreadable.

"If you insist," Four said, and the coldness in his tone forced Tris to stifle a shudder. But before he could throw his knife, Eric began to speak.

"Four," he said. "Make it close."

Four's eyes found Tris's again, and instead of being cold and unresponsive as they previously were, they were full of warning. Tris held her breath as she interpreted what the look meant. Four was going to throw the knife, and this time, it wouldn't miss her.

Four pulled his arm back for the last throw, and time began moving in slow motion.

_"Don't flinch. Don't flinch,"_ Tris said to herself, and though her mind remained strong, her body was breaking apart in fear.

Four's arm was now stretched out behind him as far as he could get it, and he began to lunge forward. Tris blinked, and momentarily looked away from Four. All she could see was the terror in Al's eyes.

Looking at Al and seeing the fear in his eyes made her remember why she was standing in front of the target in the first place. If she failed, both her and Al would be kicked out of Dauntless. And that was not an option.

Then all at once time snapped back into action, and Four followed through with his throw.

Before she could react, a sound so loud she mistook it for a gun going off blasted from the area of the target just right of her head.

She saw Four's body relax, Al's expression lighten, and Eric's eyes darken as she realized that Four had thrown his last knife… and that she hadn't flinched.

And then came a horrible stinging sensation in her right ear, and she tilted her head away from the knife that she saw protruding from the target beside her head.

A warm feeling began to run down the side of her right ear, and she brought her hand up to examine it. When she pulled her fingers away due to the pain they caused, she saw that her fingers were streaked with blood. Four really did hit her with the knife.

"One O' Eight," snapped Eric, and suddenly Tris was out of her head and back in the real world.

She then realized that the number Eric had yelled was the speed at which Four threw his knife. Was that even possible? To be so accurate at such a distance and still have so much power behind the throw. Four seemed like a machine rather than a human.

Then came a soft beep, and Eric grimaced as he looked frown from the black panel and into Tris's eyes.

"Six," he said, and he walked forward and patted Four on the back as he addressed Tris. "You get points for bravery stiff, but if you interrupt the instruction of your leader again, you're finished."

The room fell silent, and all Tris could focus on was the intense look in Four's eyes again. She gave Eric a small nod, and then began to breathe as she realized that she had been holding her breath.

She took a small, tentative step away from the target wall, and caught the scent of sage and lemongrass. It was the now familiar smell of Al, and ever since waking from her first fight and having him be there for her, the aroma made her feel calm.

As Tris took another step, she realized that no one was making a sound as she stood up taller and made herself appear un-phased. No one had expected her to make it through, but when Tris caught Katniss' eye, she found that a proud look resided on the girls face.

"Alright, shows over. Everyone out. Now!" shouted Four, making Tris jump as she dropped her gaze to the floor. None of the initiates hesitated to start moving back to the knife table in order to drop off their holsters and blades. Tris didn't look up as she began to run in order to catch up with her friends and hopefully avoid Four.

"Except you," said Four, surprising even Eric as he stared at Tris. "I want to have a word with you."

Tris nodded slightly as she looked up and locked eyes with Four, and though none of her friends wanted to leave her alone with him, they had no choice but to leave.

Before exiting the room himself, Eric turned slightly and spoke directly to Four.

"Don't keep her too long," he said. "We run in fifteen."

"I got it," barked Four, and again Tris almost jumped. Eric nodded as he ducked out of the training room.

The last person to exit was Al, and though he lingered at the doorway, hoping for Tris to look his way, she didn't. Letting Four intimidate her was not part of her game plan, and looking away would give him control. Al would have to wait, because the only thing that mattered now was surviving one on one time with the unreadable Four.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Tris and Four realize that past afflictions are current presents while having a confrontational yet much needed heart to heart.


	7. Chapter 7

There was no one else left in the training room. Just Four, and Tris. The tension was almost palpable.

As Tris watched Four take his attention away from her and turn to face the knife table, she crossed her arms and looked down at her feet. The various roles he had played throughout her initiation were all connected to one thing. Discomfort.

Its something no one wants to feel, and he had forced it on her and her friends more times then she could count since their first day. What else could he do to her? She'd already lost everything anyway. Her home, her family, her old self… What was left for him to take?

"Tris," he said with his back to her, breaking the silence between them. "Come here."

"Why?" she asked, sounding much harsher then she wanted to.

"Because I asked you to," he said, and though his tone was authoritative as always, a certain softness had crept its way into it.

Somehow, the subtle soft hues that where laced within his words made Tris want to drop her crossed arms and open herself up. But then she remembered something that hurt her deeply. Four, though she wished otherwise, was not someone who was capable of being gentle.

"What do you want Four?" she asked, and again, her words sounded far too rigid.

"To talk some damn sense into you for one," he said. "And to give you some advice."

Tris shook her head as she took a step closer to the table, still keeping a large distance between herself and her initiation instructor. "I don't want your advice."

"And why is that?" Four asked.

"You've been nothing but cruel to me," she said. "Calling me a stiff. Throwing knives at me. I… I just don't understand why you think I would want anything to do with you. I'm still bitter over-"

Tris stopped mid sentence. She was about to go too far, and dive into a place she would not be able to return from.

"Bitter over what?" Four snapped.

"Nothing," Tris said, but she couldn't help but think about how bad it hurt seeing Four walk away from her first fight. It felt like it happened months ago.

"Well it's obviously not _nothing,_ " said Four, his tone accusatory before anything else.

"It's nothing!" Tris shouted, surprising both herself and Four with her outburst. Why was he able to bring out so much anger in her? Had she not lived an honest Abnegation life and learned to suppress it well? Suddenly Four dropped the knives he was sorting on the table and turned to face her.

"Did you just yell at me?" he whispered, and the angry edge in his voice made Tris's will to put Four in his place falter.

Suddenly he was moving across the room toward her. Far too fast to not be considering disciplining her in some way, and Tris stiffened. _"If he wants to hit me then let him,"_ she thought. But just as he was on his last step to reach her, Tris closed her eyes and clenched her jaw. She didn't want to see the look of anger in his eyes up close, or the fist he was sure to raise in order to strike her across the face. She would rather have him throw more knives at her then see whatever emotions were on his face with him so close to her.

But then, the unexpected happened. Nothing. And the lack of words or stomping or _anything_ made Tris hold her breath as she kept her eyes shut.

Four was standing directly in front of her, she knew this to be true as she could feel the warmth of his body on her crossed arms and hear his shallow breathes close to her head. He, like Al, was tall, and she only came up to his chest.

"Look at me," he said. Tris didn't dare move.

"I said look at me," Four repeated, this time much more forcefully, and Tris found her body betraying the will of her mind as she opened her eyes and slowly looked up and into Four's eyes.

They were close, but not as close as Tris's had imagined. At this distance, perhaps two feet apart, Four towered over her. A tall, slim, bright-eyed man with small scars lacing their way across parts of his jaw line stood before her, and he was stunning. A true stoic beauty, just as Katniss was.

Never had she been so close to a boy that left her reeling with mixed emotions the way this one had. Four, in all honesty, was like the perfect thunderstorm in Tris's eyes. Beautiful from afar, but dangerous and ill-mannered up close. Yet for some reason, even though Tris was braving the darkest parts of the storm right then and there, she wasn't afraid. Something about Four in this setting didn't intimidate her the way it had before when he was an instructor before a… Whatever he may be to her now.

"How can you not get it?" he asked, suddenly tearing Tris out of her daze as she stared idly into his eyes.

"Excuse me?" she whispered, not able to find the strength to raise her voice any higher. Four closed his eyes for a moment and let out a nearly pained sounding breath from his body.

"You really don't get it Tris," he sighed.

"Four… _What_ don't I get?"

He stepped closer and furrowed his brows, and Tris didn't step back. What was it about the intensity behind every look Four gave her that made her want to stay close to him?

"I'm trying to- Never mind. Forget it," he said, and all to soon Four turned away from her and began walking away.

"H-hey!" she yelled after him. "What is it!"

"Maybe I'll tell you if you tell me what you've been _bitter_ over this whole time," he said calmly as he continued walking toward the door to leave.

"Wait," Tris said, but he kept moving. "Stop!"

Four ignored her as he walked, not caring to give her another glance as he neared the exit of the training room.

"I was mad because you left my first fight when I needed you there!" Tris yelled, and suddenly it was too late to take back her words, and her suppressed feelings were beginning to rip up her insides. She had to let it all out, and Four was willing to listen as he stopped dead in his tracks.

"I was… I was mad because… Four. I've known that I was going to transfer since I was an infant. I knew what Abnegation was like, and I knew myself. I didn't belong there. Do you know how much that hurt? And… My God. The _games_ Four. They scared the hell out of me. But against all the odds that were sure to get me killed I still chose to leave. I still chose to live a life that I thought was going to be good for me. And what did I get? I got bruises from jumping off a building and headaches that won't go away from a fight that I was forced into with Molly."

The words kept coming up like vomit, and each sentence burned her throat. Even though she tried, Tris couldn't stop herself from spilling her deepest secrets into the open for Four to see.

"I haven't felt safe since I was six years old Four. But then I made some friends, and you came and gave me some pointers on how to fight when I thought for sure that my first match was going to get me killed, and for a moment I felt better, but then you just… Just-"

Tris didn't let herself finish her speech. Too much emotion was welling up inside her. All the pent up anger and sadness and discontent that she had pushed away over the years and throughout initiation came bursting out of her chest. Her insides were erupting outward, scorching everything they could touch, and if she didn't stop now, she would cry, and that was not an option.

"And I don't know why I'm telling you all this!" she shouted, and behind the shout was a laugh, and behind the laugh, a crumbling wall holding back a flood of sadness.

Four remained silent with his back to her and facing the exit, not moving a muscle. Suddenly, Tris was filled with regret. How could she have expected him to understand that he gave her hope for a reason even she didn't know?

"I- I'm so sorry," she said. "There's just so much pressure on all of us and-"

Suddenly Four turned, and faster than Tris could blink he made his way back across the room and was closer to her then he had ever been before. He paused, then reached up with his hands and grabbed hold of Tris's upper arms gently. She didn't move away.

His hands were on her, and a warm sort of mystical energy was making its way into her body through his touch. She wasn't afraid, and the concentration in Four's eyes told her that he was trying hard not to do something that would make her push him away.

"The reason I said and did those things," he whispered, his lips distracting for some reason. "Was because I want you to survive here."

The touch of his hands began to make her knees weak with adrenaline. Tris was at a loss for words, and could only take in small, shallow breathes as Four watched her eyes carefully.

"There's something about you. Tris. Something that I believe makes you… So much brighter than the other initiates."

"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly, though at the back of her mind, the fear of him using the word divergent made her shutter.

"I mean… That… I'm sorry if I pushed you too hard," he sighed. "I'm sorry, and I want you to know, that I'll be here… Or more specifically, that I'll be here for you."

"But why?" she asked. "Why go through the trouble? I'm just a _stiff_ remember? I… I won't make it here Four-"

"But you will," he snapped. "You can… Because I used to be a stiff too."

Again, Tris couldn't find her voice. Four hadn't let go of her arms, and this new information left her mouth dry and mind reeling.

"You mean," Tris gasped. "You were a transfer from Abnegation?"

"Yes," Four sighed softly. "And you shouldn't tell anyone else."

"I would never," Tris whispered, and Four bit his lip.

Suddenly the tolerance for allowing space to be between them vanished, and Four found himself leaning in toward Tris. He had only moved about a centimeter, but Tris understood what he was doing, and though nervous, didn't want him to stop. But as quickly as the impulsive gesture came, Four pushed it away and leaned back, letting go of Tris's arms and disconnecting the shared current of energy running through them.

"I said what I did when I was throwing knives at you because I didn't want you to give up," he said. "I knew that if I reminded you that Al's life was at stake too, that you'd be braver."

Suddenly it all made sense to Tris. Everything from the way Four watched her as she trained, to the pointers on how to fight better, to his words as he threw knives at her head. It began to become clear that Four may have feelings for her.

"Be careful, Tris," he whispered, and for the last time he turned away from her and began walking toward the door to leave.

The heat of the moment, the passion in his eyes… Was it really directed at her? Had they almost kissed? It was almost too outrageous to even consider, but then again… Around Four, Tris found, nothing in reality could be trusted, and among those things that couldn't be trusted were her feelings. They seemed to be the most susceptible to corruption when his deep eyes met hers.

Tris couldn't find the strength to move her frozen limbs, and only watched Four as he ran a hand through his hair just as he passed the threshold of the doorway. Pausing suddenly, he turned his head slightly in order for Tris to hear him say something.

"You should eat fast after the jog," he said. "Something serious is going to happen tonight in terms of training... You'll need your energy. Oh, and watch out for your Stalwart friend. Eric's got his eye on her."

And with that he was gone, leaving Tris wondering once again what was going through his head along with her own.

Then she realized that three things in her life had gotten better.

The first being that Katniss didn't see her as a stranger anymore. The second was the fact that Four didn't want her to fail as she originally thought. And the last, was that she didn't mind when Four looked at her anymore. She didn't mind him touching her or pushing her to do better as she once had. She had finally come to terms with wanting something more than friendship with a boy, and it was more than exciting. Things were beginning to change, and Tris could only hope that she could keep up with the pace of her new life in Dauntless.

But then another thought came to her as she stood alone in the training room. Four had warned her that Eric had his eye on her Stalwart friend.

Suddenly vivid images of Eric watching Katniss as she trained and threw knives at her target came into Tris's mind. It then became clear that just as Four may be developing feelings for _her_ , Eric may have been developing something for Katniss.

Four was right. She _did_ have to look out for her now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: The initiates take part in a Dauntless tradition that tests their abilities. Peeta and Tris begin to bond over a stressful situation.


	8. Chapter 8

"And he just wanted to tell you to watch your back?" asked Christina, her hair blowing wildly in the wind due to the open windows of the train car.

The initiates where now on their way to some midnight Dauntless game that Four and Eric were anxious to get underway. No one had any idea where they were going, but Tris suspected that whatever was about to happen had something to do with Four's warning.

"Yeah," Tris said. "That's it. He was really… Forceful about it."

"Well are you surprised? You stood up to _Eric_ Tris. The guy is a sadist. Why _wouldn't_ he want to warn you? But then again Four did through knives at you, so I guess he's just as crazy right?"

"I'm not so sure anymore," Tris sighed, and suddenly Christina was giving her the signature _you-arn't-telling-me-something_ face that Tris had come to memorize so well. Without warning, Tris's resolve to keep her intimate moment with Four a secret began to wash away.

"Well?" Christina said, and Tris bit her lip as she remembered Four biting his.

"Okay, I… I'll tell you more tonight once we get back. Okay?" she whispered, and Christina nodded.

Suddenly, the remaining members of The Six had found their way to the two girls. Katniss, equipped with her usual dark braid and Peeta by her side, gave Tris and Christina a small nod as she slid between a few other initiates to reach them.

"Bit late for us to go out to get some fresh air," Katniss said as she reached them. Will and Al, who were close to Tris and Christina as they spoke about Four in private, saw Katniss and Peeta approach the girls and decided to joined them.

"When are we _ever_ just getting fresh air?" smiled Christina, and Tris shook her head as she realized that the answer was never.

"Is it just me," Tris said, giving Christina a look. "Or are they trying to kill us?"

Christina laughed as she remembered saying those exact words to Tris when they had first met, and just like that, the group recovered from the whole Knives-being-thrown-at-Tris ordeal and were back to their usual light-hearted conversations. The break from the gloom was long overdue, and it was all that any of them really wanted.

Suddenly, more and more initiates – both Dauntless born and transfer alike – where making their way to the center of the train where Tris and her friends stood.

Eric stood up straight from the spot he leaned on against the train wall, and dropped the huge duffle bag slung around his shoulder to the ground. It smacked the floor with a loud thud, and everyone jumped.

"I'm not gonna repeat this, so I hope everyone's listening!" he shouted, and the train fell silent. Through the thick crowd, Tris could roughly see Four join Eric as he began his speech.

"The reason we're out on this train at midnight is because we're about to take part in a Dauntless tradition. It's a game of Capture The Flag, but with a twist."

He then leaned forward and unzipped his duffle bag, and a huge amount of scary looking guns fell to the floor.

"Whoa," Will gasped.

"Whoa is right," Christina gasped back, making Will smile down at her. For some reason, Tris was beginning to think that Will and Christina were growing closer then she originally thought possible. Christina was from Candor after all, and Will from Erudite. Surly their personalities would clash, yet here they stood, showing each other nothing but loving gestures. Before Tris could think more about Christina and Will's bond, Eric continued his speech.

"These are real guns," he said. "But we won't be using real bullets. These are darts. And if you get shot with one, they stimulate the pain of a real bullet wound. But don't get too scared, it wears off in about two minutes."

Eric had pulled out a single, small, bullet shaped piece of metal that had one long pin at its tip. It must have been the dart he was talking about, and the thing looked horrifying.

"You're going to be split up into two teams, with Four and me being the teams leaders," announced Eric. "We're going to take turns picking members for our teams, and then my team will get off the train first and hide our flag while Four's team exits at a different part of the playing grounds. Now I've decided to let Four pick first-"

"No," Four interrupted. "I insist. You pick first."

"Well," Eric smiled. "If you _insist_ , then sure. Now who do I want first…"

Eric paused and scanned the initiates on the train around him, pausing for a moment on Katniss, then slipping past her. Tris didn't miss Eric's eyes linger on Katniss.

"Peter," he announced, and Four didn't seem surprised.

"I'll take the stiff," said Four, and the entire train began to chuckle, making Tris's cheeks heat up. Eric scoffed before giving Tris a sideways look.

"Got a soft spot for the weak ones eh Four?" he grinned, but Four didn't let any emotion come to his face.

"Alright then," Eric said as the train calmed down. "Katniss."

Oh no. And again, the divide between Katniss and Tris was being hammered back into place. Not to mention the fact that Eric may or may not have something out for Katniss. It didn't matter whether his intentions were good or bad. As long as she remained in Eric's mind, Tris knew that she was in trouble.

"Christina," said Four, and Eric chuckled again.

"Edward," he said, and the next names came flying out as if they had already decided their teams months ago.

Within a few moments, the teams where decided, and Tris was surprised. Right off the bat, Four had chosen her, then Christina, Peeta, Will, and Al.

Tris had stopped listening after the last of her friends names were called, and all she could think about was Katniss. She was on the opposing team with peter and his entire crew of Molly, a tough muscular boy named Edward who won his first fight, another boy named Drew who was also skilled with a knife, and different boy who Tris hadn't recognized.

"My team, time to get off!" shouted Eric, and Katniss turned to look back at her small group of friends. Hopefully, Tris thought, they would still be close after tonight events.

"Whatever happens, no hard feelings," Katniss said, and the entire group nodded in agreement. Again Tris was shocked to find that Katniss was thinking the same thing she was.

Shortly after, Eric's group was gone, taking Katniss with them, and Peeta though outwardly brave seemed scared on the inside.

The only thing left to do was follow Four's lead and pick up their own set of guns and ammunition.

Ten minutes later Four's team jumped of the train, and the moment Tris's feet hit the ground, she knew that this was no ordinary training exercise.

***

It was nearly pitch black outside, and to take a step forward meant risking running into a tree or person.

Upon further inspection, Tris found that the grounds for the game of capture the flag was not a forest as she had pictured in her head, but instead a massive amusement park, just like the ones she had seen pictures of in her old school classrooms. And to her left, off by about a hundred meters, was a towering ferris wheel, complete with tendrils of plant growth and rust along its metal structure.

Four quickly rounded everyone up as he explained some further rules about the game. He said that it was meant to simulate real war conditions, and if – god forbid – one of the initiates were reaped and put in the hunger games, they would better be able to cope with their surroundings.

"And now all we have to do is hide our flag, and find the other teams one," Four finished. "Now comes the time to start strategizing."

Christina, of course, was the first to speak up.

"We should hide the flag as best we can," she said. "And split into two teams. One that looks for Eric's flag and one who protects our own."

"No, I think it would be smarter to locate Eric's flag and have _all of us_ storm his team," said Will, and the debate was on. Various initiates began throwing their opinions into the mix, and Four simply stepped back as he watched each of them carefully.

For a moment, Tris was going to suggest something, but decided against it as her shy Abnegation self told her to not speak. She was no leader after all, not like Christina or Will. But then she let the idea back into her head, and realized that it could seriously help her teams cause.

Backing up and out of her group's discussion, she slipped unnoticed away from the conversation, only to find that Peeta had just done the same thing.

She watched as he jogged toward the ferris wheel, and realized that he had the same idea she did.

Running to catch up to him, she whispered his name as loudly as she could without letting the others hear her.

"Peeta!" she said. "Hey! What are you doing?"

"Oh, Tris?" he said as he reached the base of a large tree next to the ferris wheel. "What is it?"

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Well, everyone was talking about what to do next, and I started thinking 'what would Katniss do?' and then I realized that she would climb this tree and try to get a view of the opposing teams flag," he explained, and instantly Tris was impressed. Peeta was smarter than he gave himself credit for. He seemed to understand Katniss so well, that he practically was her. But Tris assumed that since the two seemed to have been friends for such a long time, the synchronicity was bound to form between them.

"Funny," Tris said. "I had the same idea, except I was going to climb the ferris wheel."

Pointing up and beyond the tree that Peeta intended to climb, Tris began walking toward the wheel while Peeta gawked at her insanity.

"Are you crazy? That thing looks like it's a second away from falling apart!" he said, but Tris was already on the move.

"Come on!" she said, and before he could stop her Tris ran to the base of the ferris wheel and found a maintenance ladder that led up to the center of the wheel.

"Oh god…" Peeta sighed. "She's just like Katniss."

***

It didn't take long for Tris to reach the halfway point on the ladder, and by willing herself not to look down, she didn't feel too afraid.

Suddenly the ladder started shaking slightly, and she looked back to see that Peeta had joined her in her efforts. She was grateful, since she truthfully didn't want to climb the wheel alone.

"Keep going," gasped Peeta. "We're almost there."

"You afraid of heights?" Tris asked, and Peeta nodded slightly as he focused on his breathing.

Tris smiled to herself as she turned and continued up the ladder. How had she gotten so lucky in finding him as a friend?

They continued to climb, and after another gratuitous minute of labour, Tris reached the center of the wheel, but realized that it wasn't high enough to get a good view of the landscape.

As Peeta reached her, Tris stood and balanced on one of the middle rungs of the ferris wheel. As Peeta pushed himself up and stood beside her, Tris could feel the tension in his body, and felt bad as she said "we need to go higher."

Peeta swallowed hard and looked her in the eyes, almost in a panic as her words registered. Wind blew strong against their bodies at their current height, and Peeta braced himself against the rung opposite Tris in order not to fall or pass out.

"No," he gasped. "I think this. Oh wow. This is high enough. Please?"

"It's okay Peeta, you can go back down, but I can't see anything form this height. I have to keep going," she said, and before he could stop her Tris began climbing the rungs between the long metal poles that held the wheel together. Peeta couldn't hold back the trembling sigh that was growing in his chest from leaving his body.

"Yeah," he sighed to himself. " _Exactly_ like Katniss."

As Tris climbed higher, Peeta quickly gathered up his courage and grabbed hold of the same rung Tris had used, and started to climb.

As the two went higher, the temperature dropped and wind picked up, making them feel as though the wheel were swaying from side to side.

Peeta gripped the bars he was using to climb tighter and tighter with each meter he put between himself and the ground, while Tris pushed on with determination as she finally reached a point she deemed high enough.

"Okay," she said breathlessly. "I think this is high enough."

"Oh thank God for that!" Peeta yelled up to her, and Tris couldn't help but laugh.

In a moment, Peeta had climbed up high enough to see Tris eye to eye, and for a while the two just stared out into the vast array of odd shapes poking out of plant growth beneath them.

"Wow," Peeta gasped, and Tris couldn't have put the feeling of being so high off the ground in better words herself.

Above them was a sky so full of stars it made them blink hard to see if their eyes were tricking them, and stretched out below were dozens of trees and raised metal tracks that rides at the amusement park must have ran on. The light from the moon and stars left a subtle, pale glow on everything it touched, and its majesty was awe inspiring.

"This is amazing," Peeta smiled.

"But still no sign of Eric's team," Tris sighed, and suddenly Peeta remembered why they had risked their lives climbing up there.

"Oh, right. We, uh. Have to find his flag," he said as he began to sink into a sitting position. Letting his legs relax, he held onto a thick metal pole to his right as he sat on a horizontal rung as if it where a bench in the park. And a moments hesitation later, Tris did the same and sat opposite him.

"So. Um," Peeta began. "We can't see them. So what do we do know?"

"What would Katniss do?" Tris asked, and Peeta shrugged as he smiled in his usual gentle way at her.

"She wouldn't give up," he said. "She would wait."

"Then I guess we'll wait too," Tris replied, and letting her body relax she closed her eyes and let her hair sway in the strong wind that blew through the wheel.

Peeta watched her as she leaned her head against the pole to her right, and wished that he could be as relaxed as she was. He then realized that he would only be able to relax and refrain from vomiting due to his fear of heights if he was talking to someone. The distraction would help him.

"So why'd you transfer to Dauntless?" he asked, and then instantly pursed his lips as he realized that the question may have been too personal.

Tris only opened her eyes and sat up straighter as she took in a deep breath.

"I left because I didn't feel like I belonged in Abnegation," she said simply. "I guess I've always been worried that I wouldn't fit in _anywhere_."

"Oh," Peeta sighed. "I get it. I can relate. So you had aptitude for Dauntless-"

"Yes," Tris said a little too quickly, and Peeta gave her an odd look.

"I mean... yes," she said, quieter this time. "The aptitude test was pretty rough though, it made me sick so I had to go home straight away."

Suddenly Tris felt her cheeks go red, and was thankful that it was dark enough outside for Peeta not to notice. But why had she told him that? She knew that if she kept talking she would let something slip, but the more nervous she got the more she seemed to say. Finally, she looked down toward her swinging feet and away from Peeta's quizzical gaze. While Tris was trying to hide the fact that there may be something that she was hiding, Peeta stared wide eyed at her as if she had grown horns and a tail.

Suddenly, the similarities between Tris and Katniss made Peeta feel nauseas as a single thought came into his head. _"The aptitude test made Katniss_ 'sick' _too,"_ he thought to himself, and at that moment, he realized that the impossible may have happened.

Maybe… just maybe… Tris was divergent, just as Katniss was.

Clearing his throat, Peeta shook his head clean of the idea, but refused to forget it.

"After I took the test, I was shocked with me results," he said sheepishly, and Tris looked up.

"Me too," she said with a small smile. "So you ended up getting Dauntless? I'm not surprised. You are strong after all, and brave enough to face your fears."

Peeta smiled at her as he sighed lightly. "No, no…" he said. "I don't really belong here."

"What do you mean?" Tris asked.

"Sure I can fight I guess, but you don't need to be brave to do that."

"Well I think you do," Tris smiled, hoping that her words would comfort him.

"It's more then that, Tris," Peeta said. " It's just… I didn't know what I was going to do if me and Katniss got split up."

"Oh," Tris gasped, and suddenly she understood so much more about the boy sitting across from her. "I don't mean to offend you. But... You didn't have aptitude for Dauntless did you?"

Peeta chuckled lightly as he shook his head. "No," he said. "I didn't."

"But you came here for Katniss," Tris guessed.

"Yes. I did."

"Oh my God. Peeta… If you don't think that coming here for the person you care about most doesn't make you Dauntless then I don't know what does."

"Well when you put it that way…" Peeta said with a hint of a smile.

"Can I ask what you actually had aptitude for?"

"Amity," Peeta sighed, and Tris wasn't surprised at all. "Katniss has always known that she would end up here. Don't tell her I told you this, but her dad was a transfer from Dauntless, and he used to teach her how to fight and use knives."

"Wow, that explains a lot," Tris said, and Peeta nodded his head.

"Yeah, she's something else… Always has been. But, you know, when she told me she was leaving I couldn't let her go alone. I had to make sure she was okay."

"I don't think you realize just how perfect a fusion of Amity and Stalwart you are Peeta. Loyal and kind. I think those are the best things a person can be," Tris said, and Peeta nodded his head in silent agreement.

"I guess you're right," he smiled, and the word 'divergent' once again popped into his head.

For some reason, he wished he was divergent, just so that he could feel closer to Katniss. But then he remembered the way she acted, along with how Tris admitted to never feeling like she belonged anywhere, and concluded that the chances of Tris being divergent were very high. There wasn't any real proof, but his gut told him that nothing in this world was impossible, and that meeting Tris was no natural coincidence. It was almost as if the universe were drawing himself, Tris, and Katniss together, and the thought made Peeta think of Gale and his quest for answers in Candor. Peeta then made a mental note as he finalized his thoughts. He had to remember to go see Gale with Katniss on visiting day.

"Do you think Katniss is safe here?" Tris asked, and her question was so sudden and related to Peeta's thoughts so well that he nearly gasped and fell off the ferris wheel.

"What?" he asked as he cleared his throat. "Sorry, wait. What was your question?"

"I asked if you thought that Katniss was safe here," Tris repeated.

"Why do you ask that?" Peeta said, and in the back of his mind he was hoping Tris wouldn't use the word 'divergent'.

"Because I don't think she is," Tris said, and Peeta shuddered. "I think that Eric- Actually, its a crazy idea."

"What does anything about Katniss have to do with Eric?"

"I'm not sure myself. I think that he may-" Tris sighed as she forced herself to use her words. "I think that he wants her. Or. Something."

"What do you mean _wants_ her?"

"I mean... Oh never mind. It's insane, really," Tris sighed.

The look on Peeta's face was a perfect mixture of shock, confusion, and sudden realization. Tris bit her lip as Peeta's reaction verified her own worries, as she realized that he must have come to the same conclusion she had. But against all odds, Peeta started laughing.

"No way!" he yelled. "He's, well, why would-"

He stopped short, and Tris couldn't help but wish that Four and her's shared hunch was wrong.

"Just make sure they don't spend any time alone," Tris said, and for some reason the words felt fake and awkward as they left her mouth. Was she really considering Eric's attraction to Katniss to be real?

Suddenly Peeta was shaking his head as if to completely drop the topic of Eric and Katniss.

"Tris, I think that its ridiculous to say that Eric has a thing for Katniss," he shrugged. "But... I just have, uh, one sort of weird question to ask you. What. Um… Did you really have aptitude for Dauntless?"

Suddenly Tris's mouth went dry, and her grip on the pole she supported herself with tightened. What was Peeta getting at?

"Yeah, I did," she said, not looking him in the eyes, and instead focusing her gaze on a small pinprick of neon green flashing in the distance.

"I'm only asking because. Well, it's hard to explain, but-"

"Look!" Tris yelled, and Peeta nearly fell off the ferris wheel as Tris's yelp made him jump.

Tris was pointing to a tall building far off near the other end of the park. It was close to a large pond with a merry-go-round positioned awkwardly at its base, and Peeta knew instantly what she was pointing at.

All around the base of the building, like ants swarming the entrance of their hill, was Eric's team. As Peeta looked up from the initiates on the ground and followed Tris's outstretched hand to where it pointed on the building, he saw Eric's flag clear as day blowing in the wind from the top of the highest tower. It was inside a small room, and surely at least three or four initiates where personally guarding it.

"That's it," Tris breathed, and in a flash she was moving down the wheel.

Peeta paused for a moment and considered all that had happened. Himself and Tris had only been up at the top of the wheel for about four minutes, but Tris had revealed more about herself then she must have believed.

Shaking his head and smiling at the ridiculous efforts of the small blonde, Peeta quickly forced back his fear of heights and positioned himself to begin descending.

***

It was much easier climbing down than it was up, and before they knew it, Peeta and Tris's feet where planted firmly on the ground.

Almost instantly, Four and the others where by there side, asking what they were doing and what had taken them so long while Four only watched Tris with expectant eyes.

"We found them," she said breathless. "Me and Peeta, we found where they put their flag, and watched the way they positioned themselves in order to defend it."

Looking over at Peeta, Tris pursed her lips as if to say _'its-your-turn-to-talk-because-I'm-too-shy',_ and lowered her head.

Peeta cleared his throat before addressing his team.

"I'm pretty sure that Eric's plan is to wait for us to go to him, he's making sure that nothing can get through to his flag, and no one on his team has made an effort to look for our flag. So... We should either go in head on, or wait them out, and hope for them to move and then try to sneak past the majority of their team so we can get the flag."

Four considered this, and then nodded his head as if reaching some mental conclusion.

"Anyone have suggestions?" he asked, and again Christina and Will were the first to chime in.

It was nice, in a way, to be able to watch them debate so intensely the way they always did. Tris could tell that the two were growing closer and closer each day, and that fact made her smile brightly.

And then everyone began throwing in idea's as they had before, and Peeta began explaining the layout of the base of the building Eric was occupying and how many kids he saw. Everything was working out perfectly, and Four began nodding his head slowly as a plan formed in his head from listening to everyone's input.

Tris looked around at the members of the team that Four had gathered. In all honesty, she liked the kids here. Most of them were her friends, and the others she had seen to be descent people when the Dauntless-born initiates and the transfers trained together. It was then that Tris understood why Four went for the kids he did. He wasn't focusing on brute strength or agility or anything like that as Eric was. Four was focusing on teamwork, and that was exactly what would drive them all to victory.

Four smiled his first genuine smile in all the time that Tris had known him, and while patting Peeta on the back, he gave her a kind nod of approval.

"This is good," he said. "Now everyone listen up. I've got a plan, and here's what we're going to do."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Katniss, Christina, and Tris find themselves playing lead roles in the capture-the-flag war between Four and Eric.


	9. Chapter 9

"Okay, everyone needs to quiet down!" Katniss shouted, and instantly all eyes were on the girl who scored a perfect on her first throw with a knife. "I have a plan, and its foolproof."

"Oh really?" scoffed Peter, and a few other kids chuckled as he stared Katniss down. "And what could be better than my idea?"

"Your idea's going to get us all shot," said Katniss, and Peter laughed.

"You've got to be kidding me," he said as he looked over at Eric, and to his surprise, his team leader didn't seem as sympathetic toward him as he had hoped.

"Let her speak," Eric boomed, and Peter slowly brought his attention back to Katniss as he stifled a scowl.

Trying hard not to make eye contact with Eric, Katniss began to explain her plan.

"It's simple, but I think it's our best option. We wait for Four's team to come to us."

The entire team burst into a fit of laughter, and Katniss understood why. Waiting patiently was not any of their styles, and especially not Eric's from what she gathered, but as he waved a hand signaling for the team to quiet down, everyone was back to watching Katniss.

"We need to hit them first, and hit hard!" yelled Peter, and a few other kids raised their fists as they shouted in agreement, but Katniss shook her head.

"We're going to wait, and hide our flag at the top of that building," she said, pointing behind her and up into the darkness.

Beyond a thick set of trees and plant growth was the silhouette of an official looking yet dilapidated brick building. Eric seemed intrigued, but Peter looked furious.

"Its perfect," Katniss said. "Our team is full of the strongest initiates that Dauntless has-"

Her words were cut off by whoops and hollers as she took in a deep breathe before continuing.

"If we hide our flag at the top of that building in the highest tower, then we can space ourselves out around it and defend while the other team is forced into a battle they can't win. If they get passed the people defending the outside, then they'll still have to make it all the way to the top floor, and we'll have other members of the team inside the building waiting to ambush. And once we've taken them all down, the only thing left to do is find their flag."

Katniss had finished speaking, and again, Peter was quick to judge.

"That's just plain stupid," he said. "We'd be boxing ourselves in, and letting them get close to our flag is too much of a risk."

"You're right, it would be too risky, but only if we didn't have initiates hide throughout the area's surrounding the building as well. They'd have to be far enough out as to not get held up in the crossfire, but close enough to run in and shoot at the other team from behind once they get here. If we position them well then we'll have the perfect formation. People shooting them head on, and others shooting from the back who would seem to of come out of nowhere and close them in. it would be over before they knew it."

Peter, for a moment, was silent and unresponsive. A quiet Peter was something one rarely saw, and Katniss basked in her small victory before turning her attention to Eric.

"What do you think?" she asked, her words bold and challenging as she stared him in the eyes.

For a long while Eric was quiet, simply staring back at Katniss as he thought through her plan. Katniss thought that he would throw the entirety of her idea out the window - since he was so stubborn - and seemed to favour Peter anyway, but to everyone's surprise, he began nodding his head as he rubbed at his chin.

"Alright," he said. "Seems pretty solid."

"You've got to be kidding me!" shouted Peter, but no one backed him up as Eric gave him a look that seemed to say, "shut up".

"Katniss," Eric snapped, and she suddenly found herself standing up taller as he started walking toward her. He was tall, about the same height as Four, and as Katniss had decided, just as intimidating.

"We're gonna use your plan," he said, his voice void of emotion. "But if we lose, its on you."

He then smiled and turned away, leaving Katniss short of breath and gripping at the gun in her hands tightly.

"If we lose it won't be my fault," Katniss said, and Eric froze mid-step as he turned and gave her a look. "This is a team game Eric, or did you forget that? If we don't work together, then we'll all fail."

Every initiate huddled around Katniss held their breathe as they watched Eric tense. For a moment, he seemed angry, but then something in his eyes changed, and he brought his eyebrows together as he stared at Katniss quizzically.

"Watch it, One," he scoffed, and with that he turned and picked up the gun he had left by the tree he was leaning on.

_"One,"_ Katniss thought to herself. _"He better not make that nickname stick."_

But the nickname didn't matter, what mattered was the fact that Eric had accepted her plan, and instructed the others to go through with it.

Taking in a deep breathe to stabilize herself, Katniss went into leader mode, and with thoughts of her father and everything that he taught her in mind, she set to work.

As Katniss positioned her team members throughout the forest and around the building, she realized something that she wished she had sooner. Eric's team was full of the biggest and strongest initiates Dauntless had to offer, while Four's had smaller members. She figured that most likely, Four's team would have better synergy with each other, but in warfare, synergy didn't count for much if the opponent was ten times stronger. In fact, Katniss believed that she would have chosen the strongest initiates for this type of competition too, since the game was short and needed a good amount of skill. That was the brilliance of Eric's choice in teammates. Hopefully, brute strength, along with her plan, would be enough to overcome Four's advancement and win her team the game.

As more time passed and her plan fell into place, Katniss ignored the looks of contempt she was given by Peter and the rest of his gang, and instead focused on Eric as he crouched behind a large metal encased generator near the entrance of the building. Something about him left her feeling uneasy and agitated. He was tall and muscular and equipped with a sharp jawline and latently dark eyes. He was the definition of the word lethal.

Then she realized that he reminded her of someone. Eric reminded her of Gale.

A strong willed man with the constitution of an Ox. But of course, the tattoo's and piercings were what brought the physical similarities to a standstill.

Gale was someone Katniss trusted, and perhaps she thought that maybe one day they would be together as more than friends. But Eric… His phlegmatic personality left Katniss biting her nails as he instructed her and her friends. So Eric, she decided, was strictly an instructor that she could not avoid, no matter what similarities she saw between herself and him or even Gale. He was just too unpredictable to be trusted, so she would have to watch her back around him.

Silently nodding her head at her own mental conclusion, she turned away from the sight of Eric, and walked into the entrance of the building her teams flag was in. If all else failed and one person slipped through the flurry of gunfire on Four's team, then she and Molly would be the last defence.

***

It was quiet, too quiet, and the waiting made Katniss pick nervously at the skin around her fingernails as she sat in the dark.

She waited at the foot of the staircase that lead up to the room where her teams flag was positioned, and though outwardly confident, she was scared of having to face Peeta if it came down to it. Her plan was good, she knew that for a fact, but knowing Peeta, he would find a way to anticipate her moves and work around them. Another thing to factor in was the Abnegation girl, Tris, who showed much promise as she threw her blade in the training room with deadly accuracy. What if she was the one to come after the flag? Katniss was confident in her fighting abilities, but worried that if she hurt Tris it would ruin whatever loose friendship was forming between them.

"This is why you shouldn't have gotten close to anyone," she thought to herself, and she bit her lip anxiously.

Pushing all thoughts aside she sat up straighter and rubbed the side of her gun gently with her thumb. There was no time for emotions. She had to treat this as if it were the hunger games. No time for friends. So she waited for the sound of gunshots.

***

Not a moment had passed between her silent resolve, and a flash of soft yet violent crash of gunfire.

_Pop. Pop pop. Pop._

One, two, then two more.

Katniss was on her feet, ready for a fight as she realized what was happening. The other team had found their base, and was trying to use the trees around the building as cover as they shot at the kids protecting it. They were here, and this was her moment.

"I see them!" shouted a deep voice, and a flurry of gun blasts began to ring through the air.

She stood and began to run toward the only entrance of the building as she saw Eric peeking over his metal shield and fire off two darts from his gun.

Everything was moving as if someone had pressed the fast-forward button on a television remote, and initiates were screaming as they dropped from gunshot simulated pain or charged head on into the opposing team who were throwing kicks and punches in self defence.

This was the reality of war, and there was no real calculation involved.

"Hey!" yelled a voice from above, and Katniss whipped around as she looked up the winding staircase behind her and found Molly glaring down at her from the top of the first flight.

"Get back from their you idiot! You can't get shot just yet!" Molly yelled, rolling her eyes as she turned and ran back up the stairs to guard the flag.

Katniss turned from the entrance and ran back to the staircase as she planted her feet firmly in front of the first step and turned back. She brought her gun up, aimed it at the open door, and waited as pained yelps of agonized initiates began to crescendo in time with each piercing roar of a gunshot.

She stood as still as she could, closing one eye as the other focused down the barrel of her gun and toward the entrance of the building.

_"It's taking too long, we should have beat them by now",_ she thought to herself, feeling a pit of horror creep into her stomach. _"It's just training. No. This is real Katniss. What if this were the games? This is how it feels. Focus. Focus."_

But then she couldn't focus anymore, and turned as she breathed heavy and darted toward a small square window to her left beside the staircase. Just beyond it she saw Four's team pouring out of the woods, charging forward as they engaged in a head on battle with Eric and her teammates.

Suddenly Katniss found herself questioning how they moved through the thick of the forest so easily. She had placed members of her team throughout the land Four had just come through perfectly, having each of them hide and wait as the opponent came running past. There was no way they would stray from the plan and do something else.

Suddenly, Peeta, Al, Will, Christina, and Tris all came sprinting out of the tree line and dove behind a crumbling brick wall a good hundred meters away from the entrance Katniss was positioned at.

"Oh my God," Katniss gasped, and she knew then exactly how the other team was moving through the forest with such ease. The answer was so simple, and it angered her as she realized that she didn't take it into account as she made her plan. Someone on the other team had watched as she spread out her teammates. And that someone must have been Peeta. She knew it was him, since it was something she would have done too.

Suddenly she was shaking.

Fear. She thought it to be fear gripping her joints and twisting them hard, but then another thought came to her, and fear seemed like a laughable subject. She wasn't afraid of being overtaken, she was excited over the entire situation. When else would she get the chance to have a gunfight with Peeta and her other friends? Again thoughts of the hunger games rose within her, but she swatted them down as fast as she could.

Noticing more movement in the tree line, Katniss brought her gun up to the glass of the small window, aimed as she saw an initiate who didn't belong to her team emerge from the foliage, and fired.

The glass shattered and she closed her eyes. Pieces of glass flew in every direction, and a sting on Katniss' neck told her that she had been nicked. But adrenaline was urging her forward, and all too quickly, the fear of losing faded away, leaving only the drive to win in its wake.

Two more heads popped up in the tree line, and Katniss aimed carefully as she shot one of the intruders in the shoulder and the other in the stomach. They crumpled to the ground like ragdolls.

Turning her attention back to the wall she had seen Tris and the others hide behind, she saw Four stick his head out, and fired off one round.

"Dammit," she whispered as the dart just missed the top of his head, and Four turned back behind the wall.

Before she could react Four dove out from the brick wall and rolled forward, finding a safe place behind an old generator like Eric had.

The blur of movement, the heat of the battle, and the constant ringing of gunshots through the air swarmed Katniss' senses as she forced herself to focus on kids of the opposing team that she could see.

She aimed and fired, hitting one, then two more as she quickly turned away form the window as she saw Four peek over his barricade and point his gun at her.

A dart flew through the window, bouncing off the stairs behind her and rolling to her feet as she collected herself and ran to the entrance of the building. She moved faster than she ever had before, and skidded to a stop as she put her back against the wall and kept an inch between her shoulder and the open entrance.

Listening intently, Katniss heard footsteps running up to the building.

" _Two. No. Three!"_ she counted in her head as the footsteps came closer.

Suddenly Eric was yelling something, and Katniss swung her bodyweight to the side as she brought her gun up and looked out of the entrance.

She saw Four, Tris, and Christina advancing on the building, and Eric shot twice at Four but missed as he ducked and shoulder rolled to a large metal work shed-like structure.

Katniss aimed at Christina, but froze as she saw the girl raise her own gun and point it back at her. She saw Christina squeeze the trigger of her gun, and before she could move a dart ripped through the air.

Katniss fell backward, barely protecting her back from the fall as she put her hands out to absorb the impact and rolled to the side away from the open doors of the building.

A horrible burning sensation began to race through her right cheek, and it took all her strength not to scream out in pain as the burn subsided to a dull sting. She brought a hand up to her aching face, and it came away dotted with blood. Christina had shot at her, but only grazed her cheek. The pain for a moment was unbearable, but luckily the dart didn't stick.

Before she could think Katniss reached back and grabbed the gun she had dropped when she fell and propped herself up on one knee as she brought herself back to the wall beside the entrance. Taking a moment to breathe, she began to reason through what was happening around her.

" _The other team is moving in,"_ she thought.  _"Eric will go after Four. Tris and Christina may make it here in a few seconds. Peeta wouldn't leave Tris. Where is Peeta? Where is Peeta!"_

Suddenly Katniss remembered that Al wouldn't leave Peeta just as Peeta wouldn't leave Tris. Then she remembered back to the way Peter looked at Peeta when he asked Four a question before they all began throwing knives.

"Peter will go after him just to spite me," she said aloud, and her world came crashing down.

For a moment she forgot to breathe as she realized the fate of her only real friend, but then remembered that as timid as Al may appear, he did fight well during his first fight. But through it all Katniss couldn't bring herself to not look for Peeta, and without hesitation she leaned forward and scanned the battlefield before her once more.

Almost instantly she found Peeta's dirty-blonde hair accompanied by Al's giant body, both of them running around the corner of some far off building attached to her own by a bridge that had fallen apart. And then she saw what the were running from. Peter, Edward, and the other boy who also transferred from Stalwart called Marvel, were chasing after them with their guns raised.

Before she could stop herself Katniss raised her gun and shot Marvel in the back before he could round the corner.

A dart flew passed her head, and she was forced to turn and fall back into the building she was protecting. She had just shot one of her own teammates. If someone had seen her, then she was dead, but thankfully, no one made a point of shouting out her disloyalty.

"Move Katniss. _Move,"_ she whispered through gritted teeth as she pushed passed the pain in her cheek and stood.

Sparing one more quick glance out the open doorway, Katniss saw Four stand and sprint over to where she saw Tris and Christina hiding.

Gunfire continued to rain throughout the night-soaked battlefield, yet through all of the mayhem, Katniss could still hear Four clear as day as he yelled at Christina and Tris.

"Now!" he screamed, and all three where standing.

Four was running toward Eric with his gun positioned firmly against his shoulder, while Christina and Tris were heading straight for Katniss and her building.

***

Katniss turned and ran back to the staircase that lead up to the flag that Molly was protecting. She calmed herself and listened as she heard Eric yell out in pain, while Tris and Christina's footsteps came closer.

Before she could react, Tris burst through the entrance with her gun raised and Christina by her side.

Christina hesitated for a moment as she locked eyes with Katniss, and that was all the opportunity Katniss needed in order to pull the trigger of her own gun and shoot Christina in the foot.

The girl cried out in pain as she fell to the ground, but Tris didn't flinch, and instead aimed her gun at Katniss as she pulled its trigger.

Katniss hit the floor, dropping her gun a few feet away from her as a dart sailed past her right ear. She blinked, and Tris was running at her, bringing her own gun up as she reached her. She then swung the butt of her gun down toward Katniss' head, but Katniss was faster and blocked the strike as she brought her arms up and hit Tris's wrists with her own.

The gun fell to the floor and skidded away toward Christina. Both Katniss and Tris dove toward the gun Katniss had dropped instead of the one Tris had.

Grunting with effort, Tris grabbed hold of the gun's strap, but Katniss had grabbed it by the barrel.

"You both out of bullets?" Katniss shouted breathlessly.

"Something like that!" Tris shot back, and she brought her fist up and moved to punch Katniss.

The girl blocked the punch and retaliated with a kick to Tris's shins, making her wince as she pulled hard on the gun strap.

Christina had now pulled the dart out of her foot and stood fast as she ran awkwardly toward the staircase beside Tris and Katniss.

"Go Christina!" Tris shouted, and Katniss wrestled to her knees as she managed to rip the gun out of Tris's grip and point it at Christina.

Just as she pulled the trigger, Tris tackled her side and brought them both crashing down to the floor, making the dart miss Christina and sink into the wall beside her.

Before Katniss could think to throw the gun at Christina's feet, the girl was gone, and Tris pushed away from her hard as she got to her feet and ran to the staircase.

Katniss was quick to follow suit as she stood and blinked away the pain in her cheek, ready to dive forward and trip Tris before she could scale the stairs, but to her surprise, Tris only turned and stood in front of the steps that lead up the tower toward the Flag.

"So you have that much faith in Christina?" she asked breathlessly.

"I do," Tris said, breathing heavy just as Katniss was.

"Well Molly is up there, and she sure did a number on you _,_ " Katniss said, her words clear and thankfully not too harsh sounding.

Tris frowned as she brought her hands up into a fighting position. Katniss shook her head as she thought through her options. She had no choice but to fight Tris.

"You haven't seen me fight, and I won't hold back," Katniss said, hoping to daunt the girl into submission, but her words seemed to have the opposite affect as Tris only positioned herself better between Katniss and the stairs.

"Have it your way then," Katniss said, and she too brought her hands up and got into a fighting position.

Tris was tough, she knew that much from watching Tris fight and not concede when she was being beaten, but when it came to skill, Katniss was sure she had the girl beat.

"I wouldn't be so confident if I were you," Tris said, and her words caught Katniss by surprise. "Christina. Right now she's stronger than Molly."

"And why is that?" Katniss asked between her raised fists.

"Because she's fighting for our team, not just herself."

And before Katniss could respond, Tris lunged forward.

***

Tris threw her arm out and went to punch Katniss, but the jab was quickly deflected.

Bringing her knee up Katniss kicked Tris hard in the side, and moved to hit her jaw with a hook punch but failed as Tris ducked under it and punched her in the stomach. Tris had gotten faster, and Katniss wasn't afraid to admit that to herself.

Throwing her fist forward toward Tris's face, Katniss put as much force behind the punch as she could, guessing that Tris would bring her arms up to block it. She was right, and her fist smashed into the arm Tris used to shield her face.

Tris cried out in pain as the sound of skin hitting skin rang through the air, and she stumbled backward.

Katniss took advantage of Tris's lost balance and moved in, punching the girl in the side of the head and then grabbing her shoulders in each hand and kneeing her once in the stomach. The second attempt was blocked, and Tris grabbed Katniss' leg at the knee and twisted, making both girls fall to the side. The two slammed onto the ground, the shock vibrating through their bodies and biting at their clenched teeth as they pushed through the pain and focused on the other.

Katniss brought her arm up and smashed her elbow onto Tris's back, making Tris gasp as the air was knocked out of her lungs. Faster than katniss had anticipated Tris recovered from the hit, pulled her head back, and shot it forward, smashing her forehead into Katniss' chin.

Stars began to dance around the room as Katniss' vision blurred, and the sudden burst of pain and taste of blood in her mouth made her scream in pain through gritted teeth as Tris pushed away from her and kicked at her legs while still on her side.

Katniss had to focus, and as she managed to blink away most of the tears in her eyes as she saw Tris wind up for another kick, this time directing it at her face.

Without thinking Katniss blocked the kick with her arm, and pain burst to life in that spot as well.

Suddenly she was angry, and the searing pain singing throughout her body crumbled away faster than any bullet could fly, and she pushed herself off the ground and dove at Tris.

The girl gasped and brought her arms up to defend herself from the punches being through at her face, and the two rolled along the ground for a moment till Katniss ended up on top.

What happened next took place over the duration of a second. Katniss pushed herself up and above Tris, landing her hips over the girl's stomach as she fought to get free. Then she brought her hand up and grabbed Tris's wrist, and used her foot to pin the other hand to the ground at the girls side.

And there they were, Katniss on top of Tris, pinning her to the floor with her hips. The moment was hers, and Katniss had one.

She then pulled her free arm back, clenching her hand into a fist and ready to bring it down hard on Tris's face ending the fight, but as she hesitated, the look of ease on Tris's face made Katniss' grip relax and her body loosen up.

"What are you doing?" Tris asked.

"Nothing," Katniss sighed. Her cheek hurt terribly, her lungs were burning, and her raised arm bled from the kick it had blocked.

"What are you talking about?" Tris asked, obviously confused as Katniss lowered her arm.

"I'm done with it. This game. Staying so distant. You win," Katniss said, and just as the words had left her mouth, both the girls heard Christina shout loud into the night from the top of the tower.

Her shout was met with a rampage of other ones, and Katniss knew what it meant as she rolled over and fell beside Tris.

The two girls lay their listening to the joyous sounds of victorious Dauntless initiates all clapping and cheering as Christina did whatever it was that was making them go insane, and Katniss looked over at the girl next to her.

Tris's cheeks were red, and obviously happy with her team's victory as she turned her head to the side and stared back at Katniss.

"What are you thinking about?" Tris asked, and Katniss could only smile as she let herself relax further.

"I'm thinking about how much we have to talk about," she said, and Tris gave her an odd look before smiling and nodding in response.

Katniss sighed heavily as she turned back and faced the ceiling, and Tris did the same, leaving her blonde hair tangled up in the dark of Katniss' braid.

The game was over and Katniss had lost, but to her surprise, she didn't mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: While the others go to bed, Tris and Katniss bond over common ground and long kept secrets.


	10. Chapter 10

Heading back to Dauntless was the adventure of a lifetime. Tris was overjoyed as a Dauntless-born boy who was on her team invited her to go home with him and his friends in a way she had never expected. At first she wasn't sure, but in realizing that being Dauntless meant taking risks, she was all for it. Christina and the others didn't mind, and understood that Tris deserved the special treatment. Peeta, who had also been invited, opted out and stuck with Katniss as he noted the painful looking cut on the girls chin.

The boy who invited Tris to come along with him and his friends was named Uriah, and she later found out that he had an older brother who was the same age as Four. She knew then that she liked Uriah, and after being introduced to a few of his other friends being a girl with a shaved head named Lynn and another fierce looking girl named Marlene, she felt right at home as they all began climbing a large set of stairs leading to the top floor of a building deep within the heart of the broken city.

She zip-lined back to Dauntless headquarters from the top of that building, and the experience was breathtaking. Surly it was something she would never forget.

She only wished silently that Katniss or Peeta had come along as well.

***

Zip-lining was exhilarating, and left Tris reeling with excitement as she pulled hard on the break and came to a halting stop just before the wall that was meant to break her fall. Or break her skull. It was all about perspective.

Suddenly the harness supporting her gave way and she fell into the crowd of cheering initiates below her, and the smile that grew on her face was contagious as everyone around her basked in the glory of having won the game of capture the flag.

"This is it!" Uriah yelled, and it was then that Tris noticed just how handsome he was with his dark skin and bright white teeth. "This is Dauntless life! You've got what it takes!"

His words were heartfelt, and Tris was nearly brought to tears as she raised her fist and shouted into the night along with her fellow initiates.

If she had died right then and there, she would have been okay. She had finally found where she belonged. She had finally gained a firm grip on the one thing she had never felt before, and with her new friends by her side, she was unstoppable.

***

Upon entering an underground tunnel that lead back to the Dauntless training room through a hidden passage, Tris and the rest of her team that had zip-lined back to Dauntless silently made there way out of the room and into the dining hall. From there, each made their way back to their respective dormitories, and as Tris silently slipped into her own, she found that the room was dark and that everyone was asleep.

A tap on her shoulder made Tris jump as she turned and stifled a gasp. She then found Katniss standing behind her, smiling softly back at her as she stood with all her weight on supported by her right leg.

"Hey," she whispered, and Tris smiled back.

"Hey."

"Tris, I have something I wanted to talk to you about."

"Okay, lets talk."

"No, not here," Katniss said in a hushed voice, and motioned with her head to the entrance of the dormitory. "It's... Important."

"Okay," Tris whispered, and following Katniss out of the room, she wished with all her might that she hadn't head-butted her so hard in the chin or kicked her leg the way she did.

***

Katniss had lead Tris through the dining hall and into a narrow hallway with a low ceiling that was connected to it.

"What are we doing here?" she asked, and Katniss ignored her as she squinted into the darkness and checked to see if anyone was occupying the long hallway that tapered off into a dark void.

"I have some things I wanted to discuss with you, maybe even hear your opinion on some things," she said, this time not caring to whisper as efficiently as she had before. Tris was now more confused than she was intrigued at Katniss' invitation to a chat.

"Like what things?" she asked, and the girl turned back to face her as she leaned against the wall opposite her.

"To begin with, I think I'll settle for knowing more about you."

"More about me? Like what?"

"Simple things," Katniss said with a smile, her voice a low and husky wisp. "Like your favourite colour or the boys you like."

"Huh, normal girl things then," Tris chuckled, and Katniss nodded her head as she smiled back.

"Yes. Normal, bonding, girl type things."

"This is really out of the blue you know."

"And so was your head-butt," Katniss said, her words coming out sounding something between a laugh and a pained moan, making Tris purse her lips as she stared at the stiches on the girls chin.

"I. Am so. Sorry," she said, and Katniss only shook her head as she grinned.

"Its okay, I was getting just as riled up as you were."

Tris smiled gratefully as Katniss openly forgave her, and a lull in the conversation made them both look down at their feet. Through the darkness, they couldn't actually see their own bodies, just the silhouette of the other person along with parts of their faces.

"Okay, favourite colour," Katniss said, and Tris looked back up and found herself lost in the gray of Katniss' eyes.

"I think gray," she said, and Katniss understood why.

"Because of your home?"

"I'm not too sure," Tris admitted. "But I think that's as good a reason as any. How about you?"

"Green," Katniss said, and Tris was surprised.

"Not purple?"

"No, of course not purple… It's green because it's the colour of trees. There uh, back home... There's a lot of forest, since we live on the edges of the city. My dad used to take me and my little sister out there and teach us about the plants and trees."

"That's amazing, I didn't know you had a sister," Tris gasped, and she could tell that Katniss was relaxing as she eased herself into a story.

"It  _was_  amazing, and my sister is twelve," she sighed wistfully. "I miss her, along with my dad. He died when I was fourteen. It was hard on us, especially my mom."

"Oh, I'm so sorry," Tris whispered, and for a moment she wondered why Katniss was telling her all this, but then she realized that the girl must have been holding in a lot of those feelings for a long time. Other than Peeta, Tris was sure that Katniss had no other close friends, and for some reason, she had chosen to confide in her. The feeling that followed was a warm and welcomed vibration that made her giddy inside as she realized that Katniss and her may still become friends. What was it about the mysterious girl from the purple faction that made her want to prove herself so badly?

"It's fine," Katniss said after a while, her words soaked in an unidentifiable emotion. "It was years ago, and it's made me stronger. But what about you? You have any siblings?"

"Yes," Tris said. "A brother. We're the same age, and he transferred to Erudite when I transferred here."

"That must have been hard, were you two close?"

"I guess we were," Tris admitted. "But there was always some sort of divide between us… Like we knew that the other didn't belong in Abnegation. It was almost like we kept a barrier between us in order to not be hurt when the other left home, only I didn't realize that the barrier existed till I came here. It was a mess of a situation."

"Now  _that's_  heavy," Katniss whispered, and Tris nodded her head in agreement.

"This is nice," Tris said.

"What is?" asked Katniss.

" _This._ Talking about all this stuff. I haven't talked about my old life with anyone yet."

"Me either," Katniss sighed, and for a moment the two girls were closer with each other than anyone else in their lives. It was a perfect moment, highlighted by the darkness of the night around them and the soft hum of the air ducts running above them. But then the moment was broken as Tris remembered what awaited them both the following morning.

"Round one ends tomorrow," she whispered. "Our last fights take place."

"And you'll win yours. I know it."

"Why would you say that?"

"Because I've fought you, and you're stronger than any other initiate here."

"That's not true," Tris sighed, and suddenly Katniss felt personally offended as she moved forward and lightly hit Tris's shoulder.

"You  _know_ you're strong, right Tris?" she asked, but Tris could only look at the ground as she let out a heavy sigh.

"You're the strong one," she whispered, and Katniss scoffed.

"First of all, dont say the number  _One_ in front of me. Eric's ruined it permanatly. And two, I'm not that strong Tris. Trust me." Katniss' words made Tris laugh briefly as she remembered Eric suggest the nickname a few days earlier, but quickly dropped the happiness as she stared long and hard at Katniss through the darkness.

"Yeah, you  _are_ the strong one," she said. "You won your fight, and I lost mine…"

"You know what?" Katniss said. "In the end… I've decided that physical strength doesn't count for anything."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that when I'm lying on my death bed I'm not going to be thinking about how I beat up some girl during stage one." There was no humuor behind Katniss' words, but Tris smiled anyway.

"I guess we've both got things to learn then huh?" she said, and Katniss smiled in agreement, but then let her light-hearted expression fade as she remembered the reason she had dragged Tris to the private hallway in the first place.

"Speaking of things to learn… There's a bigger reason other than getting to know each other behind why I asked you to meet me here," she whispered, and Tris took in a sharp breath as she tilted her head to one side awkwardly.

"Okay Katniss... What is it?"

"I have a friend named Gale, he's eighteen, and he transferred to Candor two years ago," Katniss said uneasily as her eyes darkened. Tris noticed the way she kept looking over her shoulder as though she were nervous, and her caution only made Tris lean in closer to her as she listened carefully.

"Okay, what about him?" she said, motioning for Katniss to lean in as she had.

Katniss then pushed herself away from her wall and shuffled over to Tris's as they turned and faced each other. As Katniss put her lips to Tris's ear, it felt as though all the air in the hallway had dissipated. They were now in a space void of anything that suggested safety as they stood close to each other with their minds racing. The only other time they had been this close was when they were at each others throats trying to knock the other out, and the memory made Tris's heart race with anticipation.

"He think's they'll  _rebel,_ " Katniss whispered, and the edge in her voice made a stone form in Tris's stomach. After a beat she regained her ability to speak.

" _Rebel?"_  Tris whispered back. "Who would? why would they?"

"Shh!" Katniss hissed as she continued to whisper. "Keep your voice down! Gale thought that Candor would fight against the games. He thought that they were against them. His father was head engineer back in Stalwart, meant to keep the system that supplies the city with unlimited power up and running, and Erudite trusted him with a lot of information. Before his dad died, he told Gale about rumours of people among the factions who wanted for the hunger games to end. Gale then told me. He told me…"

Suddenly Tris couldn't bare the thought of Katniss not finishing her thoughts as the girl stuttered and bit her lip. "What? He said  _what_ Katniss?"

"He said that Candor was willing to fight. That they were willing to give up their lives to end the games and-" she paused mid sentence and leaned in even closer to Tris. With her voice barely above a whisper, Tris had to strain in order to hear the end of her sentence. "-And that multiple divergents were detected there."

The world around them stood still in the darkness as Tris's stomach dropped.

"Tris.." Katniss whispered, and her voice was full of warning. "I... I have something that I want to ask you, and you have to be honest with me."

Tris only let out a small, shuddering breath as she focused on not falling to the floor as the information finally sank in. "What," she whispered back. "What do you want to know?"

"Tris, you can answer this question and not feel afraid. But I have to know... Are you divergent?"

Suddenly the entire situation was wrong, and every instinct inside of Tris told her to push Katniss away and run as fast as she could. But for some reason, she did the opposite, and instead lifted her arms and pulled the girl into a hug. Her heart was beating so violently that she was sure Katniss could feel it, but didn't care as she blinked tears out of her eyes and spoke the one word that was sure to change her life.

"Yes," she whispered, and Katniss brought up her arms as she accepted Tris's hug and held her for a moment.

"I am too," she whispered, and Tris nearly jumped as what Katniss said registered in her mind.

And with that, Katniss turned abruptly and began walking away, leaving Tris too shocked to go after her. For a moment, she remained still as she absorbed the information she was presented with. Finding her voice, she called after Katniss.

"Wait! Why are you telling me this?" she asked, just as Katniss was about to round the corner and head back to the dormitory.

The girl stopped, and turned so fast her braid whipped over to her other shoulder, making her have to straighten it out with her hands. "Because," she said anxiously, pausing to look Tris over thoughtfully. "I'm showing you that I trust you. I'm showing you that you don't need to be as afraid as you always are. I'm showing you that Erudite has  _lied_ about our existence for decades... And I'm also showing you that I want for you to trust  _me_."

With that she turned and walked away, leaving Tris to question everything that she had ever learned throughout her life.

Did the Stalwart kids know something that the other factions didn't? Was Candor really going to be the first to fight for a movement to stop the hunger games? Was it possible that she wasn't the only divergent out there or was Katniss lying? Why did she even tell katniss the truth! And still the question of what divergence even meant to the Erudite remained a constant thought in her mind. There were too many questions at this point, but at least one thing was for sure. Through the literal darkness of the hallway, a small and symbolic light of truth flickered in front of Tris as she finalized her thoughts.

Katniss, the girl dubbed as One, was now her ally, and if her or any of her friends were chosen at the reaping ceremony, they may just come out alive thanks to a secret and radical movement.

If Katniss was right. Then this years hunger games could be the one to end all hunger games.

This information changed everything, and she realized that if the secret got out, more than just her life was at stake. The entirety of her society could crumble and die. But then one other thought popped into Tris's head. If she wasn't the only divergent to be born in fifty years, then that meant that  _anyone_ could be divergent.

So now... the only question was who?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Tris has her second and final fight against the person she least expected, and round one ends. Also, the 28 initiates are shown their ranks for the first time. With round one over, the games are now one step closer to becoming a reality.


	11. Chapter 11

 

The night before had been stressful and filled with anxiety for Tris. She was battered and warn and above all else tired as she jogged in order to keep up with her friend group. Each of them was making their way to the training room in order to undergo their last fights for round one, and to say that a lot was riding on Tris winning her last fight would be an understatement.

As she looked at her friends around her, she couldn't help but reflect on their performances thus far.

Christina, who was without a doubt her best friend, had lost her first fight, but was decent at throwing knives and preformed well under the pressure of the capture the flag game.

Will was nearly the same as Christina, as he always was. Skilled a knife and a good shot with a gun as Christina proved to be.

And then there was Al. Big, muscular Al with his shy and gentle nature. In all honesty, Tris had forgotten whether he had won or lost his first fight, but judging by the anxious look on his face, Tris could tell that he had won, since he hated hurting people. But Al was terrible with a gun and equally as rigid with knife throwing. If he lost this round of fighting he was sure to be cut from Dauntless.

Then Tris thought of Katniss and Peeta. Both of them were exemplary initiates, picking up the ins and outs of Dauntless life as if it were second nature. Peeta was brave and strong and quick on his feet in difficult situations, while Katniss was the definition of the perfect hunter. Tris remembered hearing of both their victories as she awoke in the infirmary, and was happy for them, but devastated as she remembered her own loss. If Tris didn't win this next fight against whomever her opponent was, then she was sure to be kicked out of Dauntless, even if she was spectacular with a knife and a decent shot. Hopefully her opponent would be just as small as she was.

***

All the initiates were now gathered around the raised platform in the center of the training room, and the matches were written out in thick block letters on a chalkboard to one side of it.

Tris's mouth went dry as she read who she was up against, and began to scan the room.

Finding him almost instantly, she saw that he was staring back at her in disbelief.

Tris was paired up with Peeta.

"Oh no," she whispered to herself, and she could feel her heart pumping faster as seconds stretched into hours. One look at Peeta told her that he was going through the same emotions, too.

Looking away from Peeta and back at the chalkboard with the matches written on it, Tris also found that her and Peeta were the first to fight. "Of course we're first," she thought to herself, and she then looked over at Eric. He must have been the one behind it, since Four wore a sad look on his face as he looked over the matches that Eric had written on the board.

Underneath Tris and Peeta were Katniss and Peter. Then Christina and Molly, followed by Will and Al.

"What's happening?" asked a voice to Tris's right, and she had to turn her head to the side just to figure out that the voice belonged to Christina.

"It's Eric," Tris said back. "He's doing this on purpose. Trying to scare us all."

Christina nodded her head and then swallowed hard. Molly was a big girl, but Christina had beat her the night before as she captured Molly's flag. But then again, Molly's rage at the loss was sure to make this fight a blood bath. Hopefully, Christina had it in her to punch the girl unconscious if she was winning the fight.

Suddenly, Eric's voice boomed over the crowd of initiates, and Tris's thoughts became scattered and unclear as she focused on him.

"These are the matches for today!" he shouted. "You're all fighting, and not only me and Four will be watching the fights, but our leader Max will also be judging your performances."

Tris remembered who Max was, and stiffened as she realized that the head of Dauntless was going to be watching her fight with Peeta. "Peeta," Tris remembered, and her eyes were back on him.

As she found him a few people over standing beside Katniss, they locked eyes once more, and Tris became confused as she saw Peeta give her a small smile that seemed to be apologetic.

"First fighters!" Eric shouted, and both Tris and Peeta jumped. "In the ring!"

Before Tris could think to move she saw Peeta pushing his way through the crowd toward her. Once he reached her he grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her in close to him.

"I'm going to throw the fight," he whispered, and before she could react he pushed her away and was moving toward the platform.

Finding her mobility again Tris ran forward, jumping up onto the raised platform just as Peeta made it to the opposite side and turned to face her.

Tris froze as she saw the look of concentration on his face, and all she could do was shake her head from side to side while Peeta remained unresponsive.

_"This is it,"_ she thought to herself. _"He's made up his mind. But I have to convince him otherwise, or he may get thrown out of Dauntless."_

But before she could come up with a plan, Peeta raised his hands up and took on a fighting position. He was moving toward her before she could bring her own arms up.

***

The punch came fast and unexpected, sending Tris sprawling onto the floor with a mixture of spit and blood spewing from her mouth. She had bit down on her cheek as she fell, and the taste of blood made her panic as she saw Peeta pull his leg back and go to kick her.

She curled her body inward and blocked the kick with her arms and legs. Before she knew what was happening her body reacted and swept Peeta's other leg out from under him with a strong and well-placed kick.

The boy fell to the ground, but was quick to regain is composure as he pushed himself to his feet. Tris did the same in an instant.

Instantly Tris sidestepped to her left and away from Peeta, hoping to put space between them, and Peeta turned with her as he threw out a sidekick.

Reacting fast Tris caught his leg as it hit her side by wrapping her arm around it, making her wince as Peeta hit a bruise Katniss had left on her from the night before.

Without thinking she threw a punch out and hit Peeta in the stomach, and he grunted as he leaned forward with his hands up still protecting his face.

Thinking quickly Tris threw his leg back and kick at his other ankle, making him have to fight to stay upright. Suddenly he fell and was on his back. In a split second Tris was straddling him. Pinning him to the ground as Katniss had done to her the night before with her one hand holding Peeta's wrist to the matt as her right foot pushed his other hand into the ground.

Raising her free fist into the air, she paused as she realized what had happened. Peeta wasn't fighting to get free, and for the duration of the fight she had forgotten that this was what he had hoped for since the beginning. He wanted to push her, to take her to the edge and back as to make the fight seem real, and he had done his job well.

By now too much time had passed, and as Tris sat with her fist raised and long blonde hair swaying in an unfelt breeze above Peeta's face, she realized that she couldn't hit him.

Suddenly Peeta was glaring up at her and began wiggling his body as if he were trying to escape, and Tris knew that this was his way of telling her that her window of opportunity was closing quickly.

If she hesitated for one more second, all Peeta's work would have been for nothing. Everyone would know that he threw the fight. Making up her mind Tris pulled her arm back farther and squeezed Peeta's wrist between her fingers as she blinked hard.

"I'm sorry," she mouthed out the words to him, and she was sure that he understood.

She then brought her fist down, and punched Peeta across the face as hard as she could.

He rolled with the punch, but grunted in pain as his head snapped to one side, his eyes rolling back a ways before closing. Tris could feel his chest rise and fall as he lay there below her, and she could sense that he had not been knocked out.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry," she thought to herself as she stood and swept a large portion of her hair out of her face.

Standing over Peeta the way she was made Tris feel empty and disgusted inside. He gave her no choice, pushing her to do what she had to in order to survive Dauntless life. Peeta must have known that since he won his first fight, that a loss now wouldn't have cost him too much, but if Tris had lost both her fights, she surly would be kicked out of initiation. And for that Tris was thankful for his sacrifice, but her moral self scolded her as she shook her head and wiped at the blood trailing down her chin.

A long moment of silence passed, and Tris looked up and over at Katniss. She didn't looked surprised at all. She knew exactly what Peeta would do, and was prepared for it, unlike Tris.

Then she looked over at Four who stood between Eric and Max. His expression was unreadable, but something about his posture suggested that he was relieved to see Tris standing victorious and Peeta cold on the ground. Suddenly, Eric cleared his throat as he addressed the initiates.

"First round winner. Tris," he announced, and no one made a sound.

It was over too quickly, and Peeta was nearly twice her size. Tris knew what everyone was thinking, and felt horrible for Peeta as he would now be labeled as the guy who took it easy on the stiff girl.

Tris looked back to Four, and the look in his eyes suggested that he was about to speak, but before he could all the lights in the training room shut off.

For a moment there was complete silence as everyone looked around themselves but saw only darkness. And then in an instant the lights flickered back on.

When Tris found her footing and looked back to Four, she saw Eric and Max exchanging horrified looks. Why did they look so worried? It was only a short power outage. But no, the city had unlimited power because of Stalwart and Erudite. What was happening?

"No one panic," Max shouted. "One of our generators must have overheated for a moment."

Tris couldn't stop staring at Four as Max delivered the news, and the suspicion in his eyes as he watched Eric made her feel as though he wasn't telling the truth. Was there something more to the momentary power outage? No. Of course not.

All that mattered was that the fight was over, and Peeta was on the ground defeated.

Next up was Katniss, and as Tris was forced to step down from the platform, Will and Al volunteered to carry Peeta to the infirmary before their own fights were to take place.

As Tris made her way over to Katniss who was about to step into the ring, she caught Four watching her as she moved.

Holding his gaze for a moment, he gave her a slight nod, and Tris reciprocated with a nod of her own.

Suddenly Tris was face to face with Katniss, and she found no hatred in her eyes.

"Fight hard," Tris said, and Katniss nodded as she grabbed Tris's hand and squeezed for a moment.

Turning away from her, Katniss watched as Peter jumped up onto the platform and walked over to one side of the ring.

"I've got this asshole," Katniss said aloud, and Tris laughed as Katniss moved and climbed onto the platform.

Her fight with Peter was about to begin, and all Tris could think about was how odd Eric and Max looked after the lights went out in the building.

***

To say that Katniss barely won her fight would be an understatement, and though she won, she barely escaped with her life.

Peter had thrown everything he could at her. Every punch and kick was intense and moved faster than anything Tris had seen. At one point he had even tried to break the girls leg, but Katniss was just as skilled as he was and managed to turn things around. In the end, Peter was the one lying on the floor bloody and bruised.

As Katniss stood and pushed away his cold body, every initiate cheered and clapped.

The next to fight was Christina and Molly, and after them was Will and Al.

Christina won her fight against all odds, and left Molly a crumpled mess on the ground, and the winner of the next round was Will after a match that seemed to go a lot like Tris's had. Al refused to fight, and after Will awkwardly tried to get him to come after him, he finally decided to go with what Al had expected and punched him hard in the jaw. He fell to the ground and didn't get up.

After that match, Tris stopped paying attention for the most part, instead thinking about what had happened with the lights and praying that Peeta and Katniss were okay in the infirmary.

She saw Drew win his fight, and Edward – who was always a close second behind Katniss yet always ahead of Peter – win his fight as well. It seemed that the only one of Peter's friends who lost their fight was Molly, and Christina was over the moon happy about the whole thing.

Tris couldn't stop smiling as she saw Christina run up to her and Will and pull them into a hug as she walked away from Molly as though the fight were no big deal. But after Al's defeat, everyone was worried for him.

And then all the matches had ended, and Max cleared his throat as he walked over to the chalkboard that had the matches listed on it. Tris had noticed a few other Dauntless members go up to the back of it and write things down at the end of each fight.

"Now that everyone has had their second fight, round one is officially over!" Max shouted, and he was met with a chorus of appreciative shouts and hollers.

"And since it's over, you will now all see your rankings for the first time. We've taken into account every aspect of your performance thus far, and your fights during round one weighed the most out of everything else you were judged by. And remember, anyone ranking below twenty-two needs to work harder, since if they remain below that number after round two, they will be cut from initiation and forced out of Dauntless."

The room fell silent as Max gripped the underside of the chalkboard and pulled, flipping it till its back side was facing the crowd of initiates and revealing a long list of the numbers one through twenty-eight written down its surface.

Tris's heart leapt into her throat as she scanned the list looking for her name.

She had found Katniss, Peeta, Will, and Christina's ranks, and when she saw her own name she nearly fainted.

Tris had ranked eleventh out of the twenty-eight transfers, and all her other friends were above the red line that divided the passing initiates from the failing ones who ranked under twenty-two.

Yes, all her friends were passing, except for Al.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Power-outages become more frequent, and round two begins. New threats arise for Katniss and Tris.


	12. Chapter 12

He was all she could think about as she lay in bed. Al, with his quiet disposition and pure intent. Al, complete with his subtle charm and comforting words. As he lay in the bunk beside hers, Tris could smell that always-present lemongrass smell that followed him like a ghost.

She had to help him, what other chose did she have? To throw Al to the wolves and only worry about herself went against everything she was, and though her need to help Al may have come from her Abnegation roots, she knew that saving him was the only thing worth doing.

The squeaking of the bunk next to her made Tris close her eyes and feign sleep until she realized that it was Al adjusting his sleeping body. Tris took in a deep and stabilizing breath before biting her lip and remembering back to the beginning of her journey. What was she back in Abnegation? A boring gray girl with a gray personality was all she could come up with, but now she was on the verge of becoming something more. Her dream of belonging, of creating relationships that weren't based off courteous intent and fake smiles, it was all rushing up to meet her like the black pit she needed to jump into in order to start initiation. The only thing missing was her family, and the thought made her stomach lurch in discomfort. If she continued thinking this way she was sure to cry, so instead Tris silently raised her head and scanned the room. Al was asleep, his face streaked with wet lines left by tears. Katniss and Peeta were both sleeping as well, along with Christina and Will. What would come to them the morning to follow? What did Eric and Four have in store for them as stage two of initiation came barreling into view?

"Four," Tris whispered, and her voice cracked with emotion for some reason. His name now repeated itself over and over again in her head, bouncing around and hitting the walls of her skull as if trying to break itself out. His name was a reminder of the need to stay strong, and for a moment, Tris wanted nothing more than for him to open up to her and tell him of his life in Abnegation. And the more she thought of the importance of gaining Four's trust, thoughts of gaining Katniss' trust formed as well. Katniss had trusted her with a secret so deadly it could get both of them killed. She was divergent, and a lethal divergent at that. Yet she realized that Katniss only told her because she had suspicions of Tris being divergent as well. Of course, Katniss never had to tell her about Gale and the possibility of an uprising this year, but that information could be wrong just as easily as it was right.

Deciding not to worry any longer, Tris rolled over onto her back and adjusted the sheets around herself. Letting a sigh slowly creep out of her mouth, she closed her eyes and focused on the darkness. The act reminded her of the rainy night before the choosing ceremony, and she opened her eyes.

Tonight would not be a restful night, so instead, she thought of clean open fields and the taste of her long-missed plain oatmeal Abnegation style breakfasts back in her old faction.

***

The initiates slept in for the first time in weeks, aloud to stay in bed and rest till ten in the morning if they didn't wake up first. Of course, Tris didn't sleep at all, and Katniss rose early as she always did; in perfect synchrony with the rising of the sun. The two had talked briefly before Peeta woke as well, and for some reason, neither of them wanted to talk about what was actually on their minds while he was around. They thought that perhaps later they would have time, but later never came. The only thing later brought them was the beginning of round two, and no one knew what to expect as they finished a large brunch and were herded into the Pit. The tall stone walls of the place closed in on them as they approached a set of stairs that scaled the side of the Pit, and ended in a dark spot.

Tris was at the front of the pack, followed by all her close friends, except for Al, who must have not made the effort to keep up with the group.

" _Al…"_  Tris thought, and again the guilt of not trying to calm him yet resurfaced. Before she could turn and look for him however, Four caught her eye, and again she found herself lost in the ever-present mixed emotions residing there.

"Initiates, round one is over," he said, not breaking eye contact with Tris as he addressed the crowd. "And today is the start of round two. The first round of initiation was made so that Dauntless could see whether you had what it took physically to be a soldier, while round two will test whether or not you're mentally fit for the job."

Tris's breath caught in her throat as Four spoke, and the word  _mentally_ left her knees shaking as she remembered the aptitude test simulation. Looking to her left and past Christina, she saw Katniss and expected her to be looking back, but instead her eyes were focused on Eric. She must have been worried about his role in round two as well.

"Some of you will be happy to know that there is no more fighting for the duration of initiation," Four said, and Tris found herself looking back to him as Katniss did the same. "Instead, the twenty-eight of you will be split into two groups, half of you will be with me, and the other half with Eric."

" _Dammit, this again,"_  Tris thought to herself, and she looked over at Eric as he dramatically cocked his head to one side and cracked his neck.

"You're going to be split into your groups now," Four continued, "And those with me will head into the testing room above us before Eric's group does. We'll begin phase two testing, and once we've all finished and have left the testing room, Eric's group will begin their testing. The first initiate with me is Molly."

The girl grunted, made her way to the front of the pack, and stood behind Four as he continued calling out names. The next to be part of his group was Peter, then Drew, and then Tris, and by the end of his role call the only friends that Tris hadn't been grouped with were Katniss, Peeta, and Al. Eric must have had something special in mind for them.

"And that's it," Four exclaimed. "The rest are with Eric. My group, follow me."

***

The testing room was a long ways away from the Pit where Tris and her friends were split into groups, and it ended up being attached to a large waiting room at the top of the stairs that ran up the side of the Pit. It took ten minutes to climb the long set of stairs, and another ten minutes to get everyone in order. By the time the order was selected, Tris's palms were sweaty and she was having difficulty breathing. There was only one way out of the waiting room, and that was through they way they came in, or through a door that lead into the testing room. The lack of exits made Tris's joints feel stiff as she forced herself to keep moving.

"So what's this about?" asked Christina, and Tris shook her head as she watched Four walk to the door opposite the one they entered through.

"I think they'll put us under. Have us go through a sim," she said, and as she finished her sentence she forced herself to sit at the end of a long bench that stretched from one side of the room to the other lengthwise. As she sat, Christina did the same, prompting Will and the rest of the initiates to follow her lead as well.

"I'm not nervous," said Will, and Tris gave him an odd look as she tried to understand whether he was serious or not.

"Well maybe you should be," scoffed Christina, and in an instant the two had maneuvered around the heavy atmosphere that was crushing the others in the room, and managed to find a light spot that they could only reach together.

Tris opened her mouth to join in, but closed it just as quickly. They would surely be surprised to hear that she was afraid of phase two. Since she was passing initiation, the only way she could fail was to completely botch the other phases, and knowing how good Tris was with a knife made her seem like an easy pass. If only she could tell the others about what she was truly afraid of. No one could know that she was divergent, so unfortunately, they would have to be kept in the dark.

"Molly," announced Four, and suddenly the room fell silent as the girl stood abruptly and walked with purpose toward Four. Before entering the room, the girl faltered, but a well-placed glare from Four kept her moving as he quickly scanned the room of initiates.

For a moment, his eyes fell on Tris, and again the force of his glance left her holding her breath and wishing that he would drop his guard for just one moment. As Tris watched him enter the room behind Molly and close the door, Christina nudged her shoulder.

"Think she'll be alright?" she asked, and Will leaned in close to her as he playfully flicked her knee.

"Since when do you care about Monster Molly?" he asked, and Christina sighed as she blew a lock of dark hair out of her eyes. Looking back to Tris, Christina waited for an answer.

"Honestly…" she began, but her thoughts consisted only of Four and what may be waiting for her behind those closed doors. Thinking about Molly was the last thing she wanted to do. "I don't think she'll pass this round," she finished, and as if on queue, Molly started screaming.

***

Nearly eighteen minutes had gone by, and Molly hadn't left the room. Every once in a while, the initiates could hear her scream or slam her fist onto something, and just as the twentieth minute was about to pass, she exited the room.

The girl looked awful, and several people gasped as she walked out of the room hunched over and pale. Ignoring the questioning looks from her friends, she walked on toward the only exit from the waiting room.

"What the hell was that?" Tris heard Drew whisper to Peter, and the boy shrugged in response.

"Are you surprised?" he whispered back, and his words left Tris's stomach doing flips as she looked to the open door leading to the testing room. She found Four standing there, and his eyes were on her again.

"Tris, you're up next," he said coolly, and his words made her heart skip a beat.

Tris paused for longer than she wanted too, and Christina pinched her knee as to shock her out of her nervous daze. It worked, but she wished it hadn't. Standing too quickly, her hair swept across her shoulders and fell in front of her face, making her have to raise a hand and tame it with her fingers. She looked flustered, and she knew it.

"Take it easy stiff," mocked Peter, and Tris tried her hardest to ignore him as she focused on the doorway Four was leaning against.

With three quick steps she was through the door, past Four, and inside the testing room. What she saw made her stomach drop to the floor, and she balled her hands into fists as she heard the door slam shut behind her. This may have been the deadliest room she had ever entered in her life.

***

"Take a seat," said Four, but Tris didn't move.

"Tris?" he murmured, and still she didn't move. Four followed her gaze and saw that she was staring at the chair in the center of the room, and he must have understood why she was nervous.

"Hey," he said. "You know you have to do this."

"Right, I'm sorry," Tris replied, and though her tone was relaxed, she knew that Four could sense her hesitation.

The room she had entered was set up the same way the aptitude testing room was, with a single padded chair in its center and a long row of computer monitors lining the wall to its left. With the computers so close to the chair, Tris knew that Four would be able to see whatever was happening inside her head as the simulation tore through her. And now her suspicions were verified, and she knew she was about to go into a simulation, but unlike her fellow initiates she would be aware that what happened inside the simulation wasn't real.

She took a step forward, ignoring Four's somewhat impatient expression as he turned and picked something up from the table where the monitors sat.

"Do you know what's going to happen?" he asked, and his voice made Tris jump a little.

"I have a pretty good idea," she said, her voice shaking slightly as Four turned to face her, revealing a long needled syringe filled with a greenish orange mixture.

"Don't be afraid," he said, and Tris nearly rolled her eyes.

"Thanks for the advice."

"You know what I mean," he barked, and Tris stiffened as she focused on her breathing. She watched as Four's expression changed from bitter looking, to annoyed, to apprehensive, to a sort of sad understanding that mimicked the way he looked when he saw her punch Peeta  _unconscious_ the day before.

"What are you thinking?" she asked, cursing herself for once again speaking without thinking through her words before hand. Surprised, Four's eyebrows arched subtly before he cleared his throat and began walking toward her.

"I'm thinking," he said coolly. "That  _you're_  thinking too much."

"Huh?" Tris whispered, just as Four signaled with a nod of his head or her to sit in the chair. She did as she was told without hesitation for the first time in weeks.

"I mean that you have nothing to worry about," he said, and again Tris gave him a confused look.

"What do you mean," she sighed, surprised at how relaxed she felt around Four now. "I may have the most to worry about out of this  _entire_  group."

"I don't think that's true."

"Why?" asked Tris, and Four paused as he watched her bite her lip anxiously.

"This," Four said, pointing to the syringe in his right hand, "Is nothing you can't handle. It's a simulation, yes, and you won't know that you're under, but I have faith that you'll be stronger than any of the other initiates."

"How can you say that? What is it that makes you think I'm so special?" Tris asked, her words spilling from her before she could catch them and make sense of them. And suddenly, Four was close to her, the same distance they were after he pulled her aside after she took Al's place at the throwing-knife exercise.

There was no sound in the room, save the beating of Tris's heart as she looked up at Four. He stood tall over her as she sat in the chair, not fully committed to laying back as Four must have hoped she would, and the warmth of his body could be felt even though they weren't touching.

His syringe free hand was moving toward her, and for a moment Tris considered backing away, but the look of calm in Four's eyes made her remain still as he effortlessly swept her hair away from her neck.

"You'll have to face your worst fears," he said, his voice flowing against Tris's ear as she again focused on her breathing and not her closeness to Four. "You have two options; face the fear, or calm yourself down and slow your heartbeat, after that the sim will move you onto the next fear."

Tris was breathless as he raised his right hand, and brought his simulation filled syringe to her bare neck.

"You still haven't answered my question," she said, and for a moment, she could have sworn she was Four smile.

"I know you're stronger than this simulation," he said. "I can see it in your eyes."

The syringe went into her neck, and she winced as it pinched at her skin.

What Four had meant when he said that he could see something in her that the others seemed to not be able to horrified Tris, but she didn't have time to ask him about it, as her body was beginning to feel heavy.

She blinked hard in order to shake the feeling, but suddenly she was somewhere else.

***

The sun beat down on her as she sat in the chair. Looking off into the distance, she could see crystalline heat waves rippling off a few trees and dead grass.

_Where am I?_ she thought, but her voice traveled through the air without her speaking it, and she suddenly knew exactly where she was.

_Is this… Is…_ But she couldn't think it, for if she did, Four would realize that she was aware. She knew now that she was in a simulation, and she also knew that she couldn't let Four see that she knew. This would be harder than she had originally thought.

Swinging her legs over the side of the chair, her feet hit the ground beneath, and the crunchy dry grass of the dead field mimicked the sound of broken glass underfoot. The entire thing felt like a dream, and Tris wondered how only herself and Katniss where possibly the only people alive at the moment who could tell that these simulations weren't real.

_It feels like a game_ , she thought before she could stop herself, yet her minor slip up didn't seem to have any major consequences, so she let herself relax as she ventured away from the chair and examined the world around her.

The field looked endless, dotted only with a few dead trees here and there, and stretched off into eternity all around her. The endless void horrified her, and she realized that maybe this fear was the fear of isolation. How could she combat it? Find someone to talk to perhaps?  _No, that would be too simple,_ she thought, and as if on queue, a squawking from a nearby crow made Tris jump as she turned around.

The chair was gone, and in its place sat a fat looking black crow, pecking at the dried grass between its feet. Tris blinked, and the crow was gone.

_Where could it have gone?_ She thought, and again her voice didn't stay in her head, but instead spoke itself aloud somehow.

Another squawking made her jump, and its proximity was the worst part. Looking to her left she saw that the crow had landed on her shoulder.

_Hey! Get off!_ But the bird didn't listen, instead it dug its talons deep into her shoulder as she batted at it with her fist. The pain was so sudden and unexpected that it made tears spring to her eyes as she yelled and hit at the bird again.  _I said go away!_

And suddenly there was another bird, and another, and another. Now fifty or so crows where crouched on the dead grass all around her, and the hot blood dripping from her shoulder smelled sweet as she fought off the urge to vomit. She had to remember that it wasn't real, and she knew that all too well, yet she couldn't control the birds. This fear, it seemed, was not about isolation as she had originally thought.

Suddenly the crow on her shoulder twitched, and its movment made a flurry of pain rocket through the left half of her body, and Tris screamed. The noise brought on a tidal wave of loud barks and squawks from the crows, and in an instant, hundreds of them where swarming her.

_No!_ she screamed.  _Get off!_

Batting frantically at the swarming birds Tris fell to the ground as she covered her head with her arms. Claws and beaks and razor sharp feather endings cut into her skin, drawing blood as she gritted her teeth and thought hard about how she could survive the myriad of attacks. And then suddenly, she knew exactly what she could do, even though it was risky.

_This… isn't real._ She heard herself say, but her mouth hadn't moved.  _This isn't real!_ And the shout gave her strength as opened her eyes and swung out her arm. The crows were blown away from her body and hung suspended in the air, seemingly frozen in time as their feathers danced in an unfelt breeze and their bodies began crumpling like wet paper.

_Wet,_ the word brought about an odd feeling in her skull, and she turned her head to look at the ground, and saw that her blood had made a small puddle beside her.

_This isn't real,_ she thought, and she reached out a hand and plunged it into the pool. The blood turned to water before her eyes, and the sight scared her. It felt as though she were loosing control over the simulation, and just as she looked up to see if the crows where still frozen in the air around her, a broken and bloodied hand reached out from the small pool of water, and grabbed her wrist.

***

She woke the way a bullet would be fired from a gun, shot into consciousness so fast it hurt her head as she gasped for air. And suddenly Four was at her side, standing over her looking almost angry as he put a hand on the head rest of the chair. Involuntarily, Tris jumped, but in realizing that she had woken up from her simulation and was in the real world, she forced herself to sit and be quiet.

"How did you do that?" Four asked.

"Do what?"

"Get rid of the birds."

"I- they were everywhere. I only- I just dropped to the ground and they stopped attacking."

Four narrowed his eyes slightly before letting go of the chair and leaning back, allowing Tris to breath for the first time since she woke up.

"How'd you find it then?" he asked, and this time Tris thought about her response carefully.

"It was horrible," she said, and Four nodded his head as he crossed his arms.

"It gets easier…" he said, giving her a look that suggested he knew something that she didn't.

"Okay seriously, what is it?" Tris asked in annoyance, her usual reserve gone as she shook off the horror of the crow's attack.

"Im curious Tris, how long do you think you where in that simulation for?" he asked, and Tris shrugged slightly as she rememberd back to seeing the first crow. It felt to have been ages ago, and she knew that the birds had swarmed her for at least several minutes, but everything after that was a blur. Then she remembered how long Molly had been in the testing room for, and she knew that she must have been under for a long time.

"At least fifteen minutes, maybe twenty?" she guessed, and Four let himself smile. The gesture would have been comforting, but only if it where genuine. The smile didn't reach his eyes at all.

"You were only under for a few minutes Tris," he said, and Tris nearly fell out of her chair as her mouth went dry and her stomach did a flip for the eight hundredth time that day.

"That's three times faster than any initiate's first fearscape run in the history of Dauntless," he continued, and Tris had to close her eyes for a moment as she absorbed what he was telling her.

At first she was shocked, but after as that feeling ebbed away, all she could feel was horrified. If what Four said was true, then her and Katniss would obviously rank first at the end of initiation. She couldn't let that happen. If she did too well, she would die, but if she didn't do well enough, she would be factionless. The only thing more scary to her than facing the rest of initiation was the fact that her friends would have to have to face it too, and even if they made it into Dauntless... they may still be reaped for the hunger games.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Katniss goes into her fearscape while Eric monitors, and a complication forces the two into a difficult situation.


	13. Chapter 13

The room smelled of cleaning products, and Katniss couldn't focus on anything but the unsettling scent of lemon and alcohol. Picking at the callused skin at the tips of her fingers, she bit her lip as she stared at the floor between her feet. Five initiates had already gone into the room with Eric, and out of those five, two seemed to have vomited while undergoing whatever phase two was, another two walked out as if they were zombies, and the last one started screaming as though he had been stabbed. What was phase two? Katniss knew that it had something to do with being put under and entering a simulation, but what would it induce? What horrors would the simulation conjure up and throw into her mind? She continued biting her lip, more subtly now, but stopped picking at her fingers. Her father had told her once that breathing in deep and letting out slow breaths would help calm her, so she put his teachings to use.

"Katniss. Katniss?" said Peeta, his voice seeming to come from miles away. "Did you hear what I said?"

Katniss turned a little too quickly in order to face him, and her search for stability was painfully interrupted.

"Sorry, what?" she whispered back. "I was just thinking about what could happen in there."

"I was saying that you have nothing to worry about."

"How could you say that?"

"Because you're Katniss Everdeen. You've always managed, you're a fighter," he said, allowing a small smile to sit awkwardly on his face. Katniss frowned as she sighed deeply before sitting up straight and adjusting her braid.

"I'm not sure if things will work out this time Peeta," she murmured.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Because the mind isn't something you can fight to change," she said, and it felt as though every muscle in her body was about to seize up and kill her at any moment.

"Don't worry," whispered Peeta, and the sincerity in his voice made Katniss relax a little as she stopped fidgeting.

"How do you think Four's group did?" she asked, and Peeta shrugged.

"I have a feeling that Tris did okay. I think Will and Christina will be fine, too."

"Good… good," Katniss sighed, and again an awkward tension began creeping into her body. Just as she was about to stand and stretch her legs, the door to the testing room swung open, and Eric walked out with his head held high.

"Katniss E, you're next," he said, and Katniss looked up and away from her knotted fingers. Her heart had never beaten faster in her life, and she knew why.

Fighting to keep her facial expression relaxed and passive, she stood calmly and began walking toward Eric. Before she could reach him however, Peeta had stood and grabbed her hand, making her turn slightly as she looked him in the eyes.

"Katniss," Peeta whispered, his hand warm in hers as he stared deep into her eyes. He wanted to say something touching, Katniss thought, something to help her through this. But they both knew that no words could prepare her for whatever she was about to undergo, so he settled for something simple.

"Good luck" he said, and Katniss smiled back at him. A quick "thanks" was all she could muster before turning back to face Eric.

For a moment, Katniss' stomach dropped, and she realized just how real her situation was. Tris had gone through this, and she hadn't seen her yet. If Four found out she was divergent and did something to her, then Eric was sure to kill her on the spot. If she died, Peeta transferring would have been for nothing, her sister would never hear from her again, and rumors that the divergents are back would be confirmed. If she or Tris were found out here, it meant the downfall of the entire city.

Two seconds.

She would allow herself to worry for two more seconds, and then let go of Peeta's hand and face whatever fate had planned for her.

" _One,"_  she counted inwardly, and she imagined the shock on Eric's face when he realized that she was divergent.

" _Two,"_  she finished, and the last horror filled thought she had was founded on the fear of losing the only family she had left, both her blood family, and her new one. The Six, it seemed, would have to fight harder now than they ever had before.

Katniss let go of Peeta's hand and focused on pushing back all the anxiety ripping her insides apart. This was no time to be the scared and fatherless Katniss that she was when she was twelve. Now was the time to be a survivor. Now was the time to be the Katniss that everyone needed her to be. So she turned fully away from Peeta, looked past Eric, and walked into the testing room.

***

A single, heavily padded chair accompanied by an impressive set of computer monitors lined against one wall was all that sat in the room. No windows, no natural light, and no air vents, only the bare concrete walls bereft of colour along with the chair and computers.

"What's all this?" Katniss asked as Eric shut the door and made his way over to the computers. When he turned to face her, he was holding a scary looking syringe in his right hand. Inside was an opaque, greenish-orange looking substance that looked more solid than liquid.

"You're about to be put into simulation," Eric said matter-of-factly, flicking the tube containing the hellish looking liquid as to release any air bubbles.

"Lovely," Katniss grimaced.

"Have a seat," Eric said, and he walked over to stand beside the padded chair in the center of the room.

"Tell me what's going to happen," Katniss said, her tone low and challenging.

Perhaps for anyone else Eric would have gotten angry, but Katniss noticed that a threatening tone from herself seemed to intrigue him rather than set him off. She could use that to her advantage.

"Alright then," he smirked. "Once you go under, you'll be faced with your worst fears."

"My what?" Katniss gasped, unable to maintain her serious composure for a moment.

"Most people have maybe twelve really bad ones, but from what I've seen you do, you'll be fine… I think."

With this Eric chuckled, making a light-hearted sound that caught Katniss by surprise as she swallowed hard and set her gaze on the chair rather than the needle in Eric's hand. She was horrified yet determined, and before she knew it she was turning and sitting down, blinking slowly as she fought to remain calm as she sat in the chair.

"Just do it," Katniss said through gritted teeth, and her show of irritation reminded her of Tris as she told Four to throw his next blade at her. That moment seemed like a lifetime ago.

"Okay initiate, no need to get antsy," Eric scoffed, and the look of accomplishment in his eyes told Katniss that he was trying to rile her up on purpose.

" _He doesn't get to you, he doesn't get to you,"_ she told herself, and as Eric leaned closer and pressed the needle to the skin of her neck, she closed her eyes. A sharp pinch tickled her neck, followed by a deep and heavy ache. When Eric spoke next, his words seemed to come from a place far off and surreal.

"You'll have to calm yourself down or fight the fear in order to move onto the next one," he said. "You panic, you fail. Once you get through them all and decrease your heart rate, you're good to go and you'll wake up."

The advice was good for the most part, but there was one problem. As Katniss slipped into what felt to be a deep sleep, the only thing her mind could focus on was how odd having Eric's face this close to hers was.

***

She opened her eyes, and her body felt heavy. A voice called her name, but it was distant and unfamiliar. For a moment she was confused as she sat up in the padded chair and looked about her. Tall and dark wooded trees surrounded her, their thick trunks wrapped in greenery and leafy vines. She looked up, and through the canopy of leaf covered tree limbs she could see a cloudy gray sky.

"I'm… I'm home," she said, and she swung her legs over the side of the chair and stood up tall as she breathed in the deep scent of earth and forest.

Katniss had been here before, the forest her father took her into more times than she could count. It lay close to the border of the city, and her house in Stalwart backed onto it. In this very forest, she met Gale, and ran around with Peeta till her legs were sore when they were still small children. She loved this place, and she couldn't have been happier to be back.

"I'm home," she said again, more confident this time as she began walking forward. Her shoes crunched against dry leaves and brittle twigs, making her remember her long walks after school with her father.

"I just can't believe I'm home," she said, and as the words left her mouth, a voice called to her again, and its tone made her stomach drop.

The voice calling to her, it belonged to her father.

"Katniss!" it called again, and it made her whip around and look off in all directions as she tried to focus on where her fathers voice was coming from. He sounded horrified.

"Dad?" she called. "Dad!"

He wasn't answering, and suddenly a panic began to rise within her. She had to find him, she knew that if she didn't he would die again, so she started running.

"Katniss! Please, hurry!" her father shouted again, his voice sounding closer this time as Katniss ducked under low hanging branches and jumped over fallen trees.

"Stay where you are! I-" Katniss began, but suddenly something clicked in her head, and she stopped running.

_How can my father be alive?_ She thought to herself.  _How can… No… I remember now… This isn't real._

And as she remembered the needle pricking her neck, Katniss smiled to herself as she found control over the simulation. What she was going through wasn't real, but the fact that it took her so long to realize that scared her slightly. For a moment, she wondered if it took Tris that long to figure out that the simulation wasn't real. Something told her that it didn't.

Thinking quickly, Katniss continued to tell herself that what was around her wasn't real. The thought gave her strength, and as she thought about what the fear must have been about, she realized that she may never find her father in this immense woods. Perhaps the only way to get out of the fear was to give up the search. He was a lost cause, and she knew it. He wasn't really there. There was no point in looking.

"This isn't real," she said, and the world froze around her.

She took in a deep breath, and closed her eyes.

"This isn't real."

***

The whir of engines and the pulsing zap of electricity made her open her eyes. Gasping, Katniss breathed in the thick scent of engine oil and heat. She was standing on a metal walkway with holes every few inches, and far below her she saw people running frantically in every direction as a fire spread through whatever building she was standing in.

Suddenly a loud thump behind her made her jump as she turned and saw that the walkway she was standing on was falling apart. Five sections back, the platforms began giving way to the heat of the fire that was now blazing out of control.

Katniss turned away from the inferno and started to run, but screamed as her wrist caught on something, making her unable to move any farther from the fire. Looking back, she saw that her wrist was hand cuffed to the metal railing running along the walkway.

"Oh shit," she gasped. "What do I do. Think… Think!"

She knew that it wasn't real, but the heat from the flames and the constant screams of agony made her knees shake with fear as she pulled hard at her handcuffed wrist, making blood trickle down its metal ridges.

_Think Katniss, where are you?_ she heard herself say aloud, yet the voice hadn't come from her mouth. Looking up and away from her trapped wrist, she saw that at the end of the walkway was a single door with the word 'EXIT' printed in bold red letters over it. That was where she needed to go.

Fighting to calm herself, she took in a deep breath but choked as smoke entered her lungs. Looking around herself, she saw that she was at least five stories up from the ground bellow. She was inside a building, she knew that for sure, and though it was obscured by heat waves and fire, she recognized it to be the power plant at the center of Stalwart. This was the place that supplied the city with an unlimited supply of power, and it was burning.

"The engine room!" Katniss yelled, and another segment of the raised walkway fell into the fiery pits behind her. There was now only four more segments till she would fall as well.

She knew this place, it was where her father died. It was where he burned to death with Gales father and the other leading engineers that Stalwart had to offer. The fear of confinement and burning was what ran through this portion of the simulation, and in understanding this, Katniss knew what to do. She had to do whatever it took to get out of her handcuffs, and fight the fear running through her.

"I'm really starting to hate being Dauntless," she cried, and another segment of the metal walkway fell away. Katniss screamed as it stirred up burning embers from the floor below, and an explosion shook the building. She held onto the railing as the platform shook, burning her hand as it heated up, and as the building continued to shake and scream with fire, another explosion to her right made a hunk of machinery blow out of its metal casing and land right in front of her, making the walkway sway violently.

The machinery was metal and red hot, and looked to be an engine of some sort. Simply standing close to it burned at her skin and made her back away toward the edge of the walkway.

"Dammit!" Katniss yelled. She had to get out of the handcuffs, jump over the hunk of machinery, and run to the doorway at the end of the walkway. And just as she was about to consider trying to break her wrist in order to get out of the cuffs, she realized that she could melt the metal chain connecting her wrist to the railing instead.

"This is insane!" she shouted, and against her better judgment she leaned forward, and held her cuffed wrist over the red-hot machinery that had fallen onto the walkway.

The pain came so suddenly that it made her scream and pull her wrist back, and as she did so the second last segment of walkway behind her fell to the ground.

_Do it. Just do it Katniss. Melt it off._ She screamed inwardly, and she did as her inner self told her to.

She moved forward and pressed the metal of the handcuff to that of the machinery.

She breathed in deep and closed her eyes as pain blasted through her arm, and by the time she opened her eyes, the handcuffs had disappeared, leaving behind scorched black skin, and a small flame that began racing up her arm.

Not thinking twice, Katniss jumped over the machinery just as the last segment of walkway fell away, narrowly escaping a fall that would have killed her.

She started running, and she realized that the fire on her arm was not blowing out. She was now on fire, running for her life toward the only exit she could see, but the handcuffs were off and she had made it. One more step and she was-

***

"Katniss. Katniss? Did you hear me?" asked Peeta, he was sitting opposite her, waiting to be called into the testing room as she was.

"Oh, what?" Katniss said. "Sorry Peeta, I was- I was just thinking. I was remembering something from home."

The boy gave her an apologetic look as he sighed and bit his lip. "I miss it too," he said, and Katniss felt guilty for bringing up their old faction as he sadly looked down at his feet.

"Hey," she said, hoping to diminish his sadness in some way. "We're okay here. We'll be fine Peeta, We'll be… Fine?"

The white tiled floor beneath them was beginning to shake, and Katniss dropped her gaze to her feet as she gripped the sides of the bench she was sitting on. When the shaking stopped, she looked up to Peeta. "Did you feel that?" she asked, but he only gave her a confused look.

"Feel what?" he said, and in him not feeling the slight earthquake, Katniss remembered something she had almost forgotten.

" _This isn't real,"_ she told herself, scared that if she said it aloud anymore Eric may somehow hear. Remembering that she knew she couldn't really be hurt brought her great comfort, and she could feel herself relax even before the horrible parts of this fear manifested, but before she could close her eyes and focus on breathing, the door opposite the test room swung open, and in walked two people Katniss never thought she would see again. A man and a woman, both wearing outfits of purple, stared at Peeta with such anger in their eyes it made Katniss' mouth go dry. Katniss remembered these two, they were Peeta's parents. She looked back to Peeta, and saw that his eyes were wide with terror.

"No," she said. "Stop. Peeta, don't be afraid. They can't hurt you, I won't let them."

As soon as the words left her mouth, Peeta's mother started screaming. It was the sort of scream that came from a wounded animal or a bloodthirsty killer, and the pure shock that came with the yelp made Katniss jump as she closed her eyes and covered her ears. Suddenly she heard crying. A loud wail that matched the scream of Peeta's mother, and Katniss could tell that it was his father's cry.

Her heart began to beat fast, and her breathing quickened as she forced herself to remember that it wasn't real and that Peeta wouldn't get hurt by his parents.

" _You're okay Katniss. Don't scream. Don't pay attention. The forest was worse. The fire was worse. It's not real, it's not-"_

"Katniss!" screamed Peeta, and she couldn't help but open her eyes.

"Peeta!" she cried, and as she turned to face him, she saw that his mother had him by the throat. Peeta was much bigger than her, stronger too, but in this nightmare he was defenseless against her screams and angry fists.

"Peeta! Hold on!" Katniss yelled, and she stood from the bench, forgetting her terror and the fact that she should try to calm herself. This fear would have to be fought, not turned away from.

She moved fast, running forward and across the room to where Peeta had been taken by his mother. She was only a few meters away from where he lay choking underneath his mother when she ran into some sort of barrier. Her face bounced off first, sending pain rippling through her nose before spreading to her forehead.

"Peeta!" she yelled, and she tried to reach him again, running forward but still hitting the invisible barrier separating herself from her only piece of home. She was powerless, and the screams and cries from Peeta's parents still made Katniss' knees shake.

Suddenly Peeta's mother let go of her son's throat, and he gasped for air as he tried to kick away from her. The woman stood, and began to kick him as he curled into a ball. "Peeta!" his mother yelled as she pulled her leg back and kicked again. "Tell us. Don't try and protect her, tell us!"

"Please, stop!" Peeta yelled, and his plea only made his parents cries grow louder.

"What do you want?" Katniss yelled, her fists balled and banging hard against the barrier between herself and Peeta.

"We want to know!" Peeta's father cried, tears streaming down his face as he turned to face Peeta. "We need to know what's wrong with you."  
"Me?" Katniss said in surprise.

"Yes, you!" Peeta's mother shouted, and again she went back to kicking Peeta.

Looking back to Peeta's father Katniss gasped as she saw him produce a long metal bar from behind his back. "He knows your secret Katniss," he cried. "And if he tells us, we can all live. We just need to know!"

"Peeta! Peeta run!" Katniss called, but it was too late, his father was already moving toward him as he raised the bar above his head.

"Peeta! Peeta listen to me! We both know what they want to hear. Just… Just tell them! Please! Let this be over!" she screamed, and as the words left her mouth she felt her face go red and tears scorch down her cheeks. She knew what would save his life, but she also knew that he would never tell. If she wanted to save Peeta, and move onto the next fear, Katniss would have to tell his parents with her own voice that she was divergent.

"Tell us Peeta. Tell us please," his father cried, and Katniss couldn't watch any longer as she closed her eyes.

"Katniss," Peeta groaned. "Don't, please." His voice was small and pained, and it broke her in a way she had never felt before. And all to quickly, Peeta's father brought the bar down, and hit Peeta's shoulder.

A crack wrung through the air, and suddenly Katniss couldn't breathe.

" _Say it, its just in your head. Say it Katniss, just say you're divergent."_

Her inner voice chastised her as she watched Peeta's father hit him again and again, each strike producing a louder crack and another pained cry from Peeta.

"Okay!" Katniss yelled as Peeta's father raised the bar above his head again. Blood dripped from the bars sharp edge and sluggishly ran down its shaft, covering the man's fingers in a sticky coat of red. The sight made her sick.

"I'll say it," Katniss cried, and Peeta was silent as he shook on the floor. "What you want to know. What it is that makes me different. I'm… I'm diverg-"

And suddenly there was only darkness, followed by silence, and Katniss felt her body go heavy as she involuntarily closed her eyes.

***

She woke the way a bullet would be fired from a gun, shot into consciousness so fast it hurt her head as she gasped for air. She sat up screaming, batting wildly at her arms with her hands as to fan away flames and fend of Peeta's parents, but she soon realized that she wasn't in the simulation any longer; she was back in the real world, sitting on the padded chair in the middle of the testing room. The only thing wrong was that the room was pitch black. She couldn't even see her hand as she waved it inches away from her own face.

"Katniss!" Eric yelled, his voice cutting through the dark to her left, making her jump as she swallowed back another pained scream.

"Eric?" she shouted back. "Eric! Why are the lights out?"

"Power outage!" he said, and this time his voice was much closer. "Keep talking, I need to find you."

"Why?" she asked, and before he could answer Katniss felt him bump into her chair.

"Dammit," he whispered. "Okay, where's your neck."

"What? Why do you need to know?"

"Don't fight me on this!"

"Of course Eric that really makes me want to submit," Katniss grimaced as she leaned away from Eric and pushed herself out of the chair. "What are you going to do?"

Sighing heavily, Katniss heard Eric shuffle his feet as he tried to find his way around the chair.

"You were just ejected from a simulation without facing a fear. The power outage means the sim never cancelled properly, if you go to sleep within the next twenty hours or so you could go into a simulation coma and never wake up," he explained, and Katniss cringed as she thought of that possibility becoming her reality.

"How do you fix it?" she asked, and suddenly she heard Eric find his way around the chair.

"I need to inject you with what we call the anti-sim. It'll flush out the sim that's still in your head."

"I think I'll take my chances," Katniss said. "I'd rather stay awake for the next two days than be injected with something again."

Katniss had meant what she said, but not for the reason that Eric might be thinking. What if he actually knew that she was divergent and injected her with something to kill her? She couldn't be too careful.

"Kat, this is serious," Eric said, and Katniss could tell that his patience was running thin.

"What did you just call me?" Katniss barked.

"Do you like One better?" he laughed, and Katniss rolled her eyes as she focused on Eric's voice through the darkness.

As she began backing away further from Eric, she slowly began to remember the shape of the room, and found her way into a corner. As she stood in silence, she could hear Eric shuffling around, calling out to her every once in a while until the door to the room opened and someone called out to him.

"We're fine," Eric said. "But she needs the anti-sim."

"Right," said the voice, and Katniss soon recognized it to be Four's. "Don't take long, Max wants you."

And with that he was gone, slamming the door shut behind him as he returned to the dark waiting room.

As Katniss cursed herself for not acting faster and running toward Four's voice and out into the waiting room away from Eric, she realized something that surprised her. Eric was taller than her, and though she hated to think about it, he was also much stronger. If he really wanted too, he could have found her by now and plunged whatever needle he wanted into her neck, yet he hadn't. And on top of that, Four hadn't been surprised when Eric talked about the anti-sim. Perhaps he was telling the truth, and in all honesty, Four's cavalier response to the situation and Eric's patience was making her realize that she may have overreacted. There was no way he could have deduced that she was divergent. Was there? No… of course not, and since Tris seemed to trust Four, his word would be as good as any. Making up her mind, Katniss cleared her throat before speaking.

"Eric," she croaked.

"Finally come to your senses?" he asked, his voice a little closer than it was when he last spoke.

"Just promise this next injection isn't going to kill me."

"What's the fun in me telling you?" he laughed, and Katniss remained silent.

"Just… Keep walking forward," she sighed, and she reached her arm out through the darkness as she heard Eric's feet shuffle forward. "Almost there." And a few seconds later, she felt Eric's arm graze against her outstretched fingertips. Jumping a little, Eric cleared his throat as he reached up and grabbed her forearm with his free hand.

"That you?" he asked, and Katniss nodded her head before remembering just how dark it was.

"No, it's Molly, Katniss got tired of waiting for you," she said, and Eric chuckled. She hadn't meant to be funny, yet he laughed anyway, and his response made her feel relaxed for some reason. But then she remembered that he was the one to pair herself and Peter together at the end of round one, and also that Peeta and Tris had to fight in the ring because of him. The memory left her angry again, and his rarely seen joking side became less and less appealing.

"Okay, don't move a muscle," he said.

"Wait, you're going to do this in the dark?"

"The longer we wait the more anti-sim you'll need. You really want more than one needle?"

"You must be joking. You could miss my neck and jab my eye out."

"At least you'd still have your glowing personality," he chuckled, and again Katniss felt herself wanting to smile as he laughed lightly.

"I'm not playing a game Eric, wait until the lights turn-"

Before she could finish her sentence, the thundering whir of Dauntless generators and the crackle of live electric wires buzzed through the room. Both herself and Eric gasped as the lights in the room pulsed to life, momentarily blinding them both as they blinked fast.

"You were saying?" Eric smirked, and Katniss shuddered as she saw the syringe in the boys right hand. The anti-sim looked nothing like what put her into her fearscape, and its glittery bluish hue made Katniss wonder if the colour of the fluid could be chosen before its creation.

"Still up for it?" Eric asked, and Katniss closed her eyes as she looked away from him and tilted her head to one side, exposing her neck as she did so.

"Don't move," he repeated, and before Katniss could reply, the familiar sharp pinch of a needle entering her skin nearly made her jump as it bit into her neck. "There," he finished. "Good as new."

"If I drop dead in the next ten minutes I swear I'll come back and haunt you," she said, and again her words made Eric smile.

"You should be proud of yourself initiate, almost no one ever gets passed their first fear on the first try, and you almost made it through three."

"Did you?" she asked without hesitation, and Eric's jaw clenched.

"No," he said, and though the word came out soft, Katniss could tell that he was remembering something painful. "But you made it out of there in record time, in fact, you were the fastest out of my group so far. The only person faster than you is in Four's group. I shouldn't tell you this yet, but it was-"

"Tris," Katniss finished without thinking, and Eric gave her an odd look.

"How could you have known?" he asked, and he let his hand drop from her forearm as he backed away slightly. She hadn't even noticed that he was still holding onto her.

"I had a hunch," Katniss said coolly. "She's stronger than anyone gives her credit for."

"Fair enough," shrugged Eric, and Katniss let out a subtle shaky breath as he turned from her and walked back to the computers beside the chair.

"That was pretty impressive by the way Kat," he said, tapping a button below one of the monitors and staring intently at the strips of text appearing on the screen.

"What was?" she asked, and Eric shrugged again.

"Watching you react under pressure. You were good, real good. Can't believe you set yourself on fire to escape."

"I didn't do it on purpose, and that's not something I want to remember."

"Oh come on. Katniss Everdeen, the One-Throw-Wonder, the Girl on Fire!" Eric laughed, and for some reason, Katniss found herself smiling as he looked over his shoulder at her and winked.

"You're ridiculous," she said, trying hard to suppress the smile on her face. Eric, against all odds, was growing on her now… and she hated that.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Four and Tris become closer. Later on, due to her ranking, some initiates believe Tris to be a threat, and her life is put in danger.


	14. Chapter 14

Tris paced slowly in front of Will and Christina as they sat cross legged with their backs against the Pit's stone wall.

"She should be down by now," she said, and Christina sighed before standing.

"Stop fidgeting, you're freaking me out," she said, and Tris only gave her and exasperated look.

"Are you not worried?" asked Tris.

"About Katniss? No, not at all actually. I'm more worried about the power outage just now. I thought Stalwart had the cities electricity well kept, I don't think any of us have ever gone a day with a power outage before right?"

"Right," said Will, deciding to stand as Tris and Christina had. "Katniss seems like the most capable out of all of us, and the black outs must be happening for a reason."

"Right," Tris sighed. "I know, just… So much could happen to her. And have you guys seen Al?"

Will shrugged before looking to Christina. The girl only frowned as she blinked back at him.

"Uh, I think he went to the dining hall," Will said after some thought. "He seemed like he didn't want company, so we waited here with you for Katniss and Peeta."

"Weird," Tris said as she bunched her eyebrows together. Al seemed to hate being alone, yet more and more often he would wonder off to some place where he could be by himself. Tris made a mental note to remind herself to ask him about his distant nature as she slowly began pacing once more.

Katniss was alone in a room with Eric. Crazy Eric who wanted to see her get impaled by an air-born knife. The same Eric who pitted them all against each other and forced Katniss to fight Peter. Katniss being alone with him horrified Tris, but she had no other choice than to simply have faith in Katniss' resilience and trust that she would make it out alive. Of course, Tris's situation was completely different from Katniss'. Four seemed sane enough, while Eric…

Stomping coming from the stairwell that lead up to the testing room made Tris, Will, and Christina all look up, just in time to see a serious looking Katniss walking toward them.

"Katniss," said Christina. "Tris has been going bonkers waiting for you to finish up, how'd you do?"

"Better than I thought I would," she said with ease, and her light attitude made Tris give her a confused look as the girl stopped beside her and turned to face Will and Christina. "Eric's still a piece of work as usual."

"Are we surprised? No. Disappointed? Hell yes," sighed Will, and Christina smiled as she leaned into him.

"Peeta's due to go after me," said Katniss, and Will looked up the flight of stairs that lead to the testing room and shivered.

"Think he'll be okay?" he asked, and Katniss shrugged.

"I think he's a lot like Tris. Tougher than he looks."

"He looks pretty tough enough as it is," said Will, and Katniss smiled as she nodded her head in agreement.

Turning suddenly to face Tris, Katniss gave her a brief look for a moment before smiling.

"Mind coming with me to the dorm? I want to splash some cold water on my face, wake myself up. I don't want to go alone, I'm still pretty freaked out from my simulation run."

"Sure," said Tris, not missing a beat. Something was wrong, and Tris could tell that it was something that Katniss couldn't talk about with the others around.

Katniss nodded her head in thanks as she looked back to Will and Christina. "Can you guys wait for Peeta? If he comes back before I get here, find us in the dorm rooms."

"Al is in the caf," said Christina. "We should all meet there."

"Sounds good," said Katniss, her words coming out a little quicker than Tris was sure she meant for them too.

Running a hand over her braid Katniss turned and began walking back toward the cafeteria. Tris followed beside her, and knew exactly where she was about to go. Heading this way would make it seem like they were going where she had told Christina and Will, but instead, they would go to the same abandoned hallway they had the night that Katniss told Tris that she was divergent.

"Tris?" whispered Katniss as they neared the entrance to the cafeteria.

"Yeah?" Tris whispered back.

"I think we have a lot to talk about."

***

They snuck into the hallway unnoticed and walked in deeper than they had the first time. It was only mid-day, and standing too close to the entrance meant being noticed. The cave like corridor smelled of earth and wet stone, much stronger than it had the first night they entered it, and perhaps it was symbolic for the current state of their journey. To Tris, the intensity of the Dauntless compound was increasing daily, and perhaps it was because the possibility of being reaped for the hunger games was finally coming into view over the horizon. The games were close, and Tris couldn't forget that. The darkness of the thought of the games rivaled the darkness of the hallway in which they stood now.

"What happened?" Tris asked, her tone serious and quiet.

"It was horrifying," Katniss whispered back. "I don't think Eric found out. And Four?"

"I think I'm in the same boat as you," Tris sighed, and the girls let their shoulders slump forward as their bodies relaxed.

"Thank God," Katniss said, and Tris nodded her head.

"What was the experience like, being put into a sim like that I mean. We've only ever been in one before, and it was nothing like  _that_ ," Tris asked, and Katniss pursed her lips as she looked to her wrist. Rubbing her thumb gently across it, she looked back up to Tris.

"I got through two fears, but the power outage stopped me from getting passed my third," she said, and Tris couldn't help but let her mouth drop to the floor as she took in what Katniss was saying.

"Oh my God, how did you do that?" she asked in a hushed voice. "I… I barely got through my first."

"Really?" Katniss asked in disbelief. "It felt easy, but you were much faster than I was."

"That's because I didn't have to fight through my second fear," Tris said, and Katniss cocked her head to one side as she gave Tris a perplexed look.

"What is it? What are you thinking?" Tris asked, and Katniss only shook her head before looking around herself once more to make sure no one was listening in.

"Lean in closer," the girl whispered, and Tris did what was asked of her. "Being divergent… We know that when we're in a sim we can control it, right?"

"Of course," Tris whispered back. "What are you getting at?"

"How long did it take for you to realize that you were in a sim?"

"Maybe ten seconds, I'm never sure right at the beginning… Why?" Tris said, and Katniss leaned away slowly as she looked Tris in the eyes.

"Katniss… You're scaring me," Tris continued, but Katniss seemed lost in thought as she stared at Tris with an intense look about her. After some time, the girl recovered from her break from reality and took in a deep breath before speaking.

"It took me almost a minute," she said, and Tris's breath caught in her throat before she could decide whether to gasp or speak.

"Are you sure?" she asked, and Katniss nodded her head as she closed her eyes.

"I was almost halfway through my first fear before I realized it. For a moment I believed it… I believed that my father was alive and that he needed me."

"But you still got through more fears than any other initiate on their first try," said Tris, and Katniss forced a weak smile.

"That's true, but the aptitude test was different. I knew it wasn't real the second I opened my eyes."

"Me too," said Tris.

"What do you think about _this_  time then? Why did it take me so long to realize? Do you think- I don't know," Katniss said, her voice trialing off at the end of her sentence, and Tris couldn't bare the thought of her holding back information.

"Are you thinking about your friend who transferred to Candor?" Tris asked, and Katniss was caught by surprise as she turned to look Tris in the eyes again.

"Yes, I was," she admitted, and Tris could piece together the rest.

"Maybe divergence is rated on a spectrum," Tris said. "Maybe its not just one thing like we thought."

"Exactly what I was thinking," said Katniss, and she began pacing the corridor back and forth slowly as she bit at her lip.

"I have to see Gale," she said. "He's bound to know more about the games and what divergence is."

"Visiting day is coming up, maybe five days or so from now."

"That's right, I almost forgot," said Katniss, and she stopped pacing in front of Tris and turned to face her. "You should come with me."

"I would, but I think I should see my brother instead," Tris said. "It's important. I need to know that he's okay."

"Is that more important than learning about what we are?" Katniss asked, and Tris only shook her head as she looked to the floor.

"If we get reaped," she whispered. "I want to know before hand if I can still love him like a brother before we go into the games."

Katniss seemed stunned for a moment, seeming to have forgotten the harsh reality that was the impending games that were sure to tear her world apart. Tris remembered that Katniss had a younger sister, but didn't bring her up as she remembered her own brother's face.

"I can't afford to think that way," Katniss said after a beat, breaking the stretch of silence that had soothed Tris into a quiet memory of her old home. "I'll see my family one day… Right now I need to try and understand why the city wants people like us dead. The games can come after that."

"Right… Of course," Tris murmured, and she could see Katniss' intense features soften for a moment before returning to their usual hardened survivalist look.

"Hey," said Katniss, nudging Tris's shoulder gently as she smiled softly. "Phase two and three will be a piece of cake for us. We're divergent, I mean what could go wrong?"

Tris smiled as Katniss leaned back and chuckled. Together they laughed for a while, forgetting about the horror that was initiation and the coming games. A few more moments later they were back to business. Peeta should have finished by now.

***

Tris, Christina, Will, Al, and Katniss all waited eagerly for Peeta to finish his first simulation run for phase two. They sat in the cafeteria, slowly picking at the food in front of them as they silently went over what they had each gone through in their heads.

"I think," Will began, and everyone turned to look at him. "That it's safe to assume that we all did pretty bad for our first go."

"I'd say so," shrugged Christina, and Will reached a hand across the table and squeezed the girl's hand. The gesture was kind, and Christina's gloomy expression lightened for a moment.

"How'd you do?" Will asked, and Christina once again shrugged.

"I was under for thirteen minutes…" she said, lacking her usual light-hearted attitude.

"That's not so bad, I was down for a minute longer than you. What about you Al, how'd it go?"

At Will's direct question Al looked up from his plate. His face was paler than Tris thought to be normal, and again the guilt of not doing something to help him yet hit her hard.

"I, uh… I wasn't so good," he said, and with that he looked back to his plate of food and picked at some vegetables with his fork.

The room was heavy with a metaphorical darkness that no light could cut through. Phase two had thrown something at the initiates that none of them could see coming, and the sheer amount of determination necessary in order to overcome it was astronomical. But as for Tris, the most painful part was knowing that herself and Katniss would be able to pass it with ease. They wouldn't even have to lift a finger… They would just have to walk through the simulation and get to the end.

Being unable to sit in silence with her own thoughts any longer, Tris took in a deep breath and pushed her plate of food away from herself and toward the center of the table.

"I can't stand to just sit around," she said. "Maybe we should walk to the Pit, wait for Peeta there."

"Don't think that's necessary," said Katniss as she pointed over Tris's shoulder.

Tris turned and saw Peeta sheepishly walking into the cafeteria. His face was paler than Al's was, and in an instant Katniss was up and walking toward him.

"Damn," sighed Will. "I wonder how he did."

"I wouldn't guess he did too well," said Christina, and Al gave her a look. "I'm just being honest," she finished, and the boy sighed slightly as he stood and began walking over to Peeta as well.

Turning back to Christina and Will, Tris swept a portion of her hair out of her eyes and stepped away from the table. "Come on," she said. "I really think we should all keep moving."

"Sounds good," said Will, standing and walking over to Tris's side, yet when he reached her, Tris realized that Christina had not moved.

"Christina?" she said, but the girl only bit her lip anxiously as she nodded with her head in the direction of the entrance to the cafeteria.

Following her gaze, Tris saw why she looked so nervous, and sighed as she stepped away from Will and toward what was sure to be an uncomfortable interaction.

Four had entered the room, taking long strides toward her with his mouth set in a firm straight line. He had changed out of the clothes he was wearing while he administered her phase two simulation, and was now wearing a pair of jeans with a deep black sweater. He looked intense and out of place in this setting, and Tris wondered why he had never worn clothes like this in public before. Pushing those unimportant thoughts aside, Tris thought back to her time with him in the testing room. Was it possible that after looking over the tape of her first simulation run that he discovered she was divergent? The only way she would find out was to face him, so as the two met halfway, she prepped herself mentally for a possible attack.

"Tris," he said.

"Four," Tris said back.

For a moment they simply stood watching each other, and after a while Tris could sense that her friends were watching.

"I need to talk to you," Four said, his tone even and not giving anything away.

"I can't," Tris said. "Not now at least, I need to be with my friends, make sure they're okay."

"You don't have a choice. I need to talk to you, now."

His words made a stone form in Tris's stomach, and she prayed that her face didn't give away how afraid she was on the inside. Looking over her shoulder she saw her friends all standing together, talking about something serious as they occasionally looked over to herself and Four. Giving them a reassuring smile, Tris nodded at them and turned back to face Four.

"Okay, lets talk then," she said, and Four's usual frown deepened.

"Not here, come," he said, and before Tris could react he grabbed her hand and turned toward the exit.

Four had grabbed her hand, he was touching her, and he was now walking her toward some secret place for them to talk, and the thought of what may follow – though it once seemed exciting – now scared Tris more than anything. This was it, Four must have found out that she was divergent. Her only options were to either run now or wait to hear what he had to say, and when considering how fast and strong Four was, Tris was sure that her best option was to hear him out first.

***

He hadn't let go of her hand the entire way, and instead of scaring her as it once had, it now brought Tris a sense of security as they entered the Pit, taking a right at an unlikely place and walking down a hallway that Tris had never been through before.

The smooth concrete floor gave way to the natural structure of an unpaved stone walkway, and Tris could smell and hear the rapid waters of the chasm rushing forth at the end of the tunnel.

"Where are we?" she asked, but Four didn't respond. He only continued leading her down the hallway till eventually they emerged in a sort of lookout over the chasm.

Looking up, Tris saw the bridge that she had walked on in order to enter Dauntless when she first arrived at the compound, and realized just how close she was to the waters as she looked back to her feet and over the edge of the cliff. Herself and Four were so close to the waters now that every few seconds a strong spray of mist would reach up and hit them. It was cold, but the warmth of Four's hand made her feel as though she wouldn't fall in. He had her, and he wasn't going to let go. Actually, that thought seemed to scared her a small bit as well.

"We're almost there, keep moving," Four instructed, and again Tris took note of the fact that Four hadn't let go of her hand yet.

They now walked along the edge of a narrow path that was cut into the side of the cliff along the chasm river. Why anyone would come down here willingly Tris couldn't understand, but in remembering the fact that Four might know she was divergent made her heart skip a beat as he stopped walking and let go of her hand.

Turning to face her, he paused for a moment and took in a deep and slow breath.

" _This is it, this is where he pushes you in,"_ Tris thought to herself, and involuntarily she began to spread her feet apart slowly in case she needed to start fighting. Why she agreed to go down there with him was beyond her, and just as she was considering turning and sprinting away, Four began to kneel as he turned to face the waters.

Sitting on the edge of the drop-off, he let his legs fall over its side as he leaned back on his hands. There was no railing, and seeing the boy sit so carelessly on the edge the way he was nearly made Tris gasp.

"Sit," he said, and Tris hesitated as she watched him. He seemed relaxed, more so than she had ever seen him, and the sight made her feel comforted. She did as she was told and sat next to him, doing as he did and letting her legs drape over the side of the cliff.

A cold breeze was blowing up from the raging waters, dusting her legs with a chilled mist. It felt refreshing, and she leaned back on her palms as Four did as more chilled mist raced up to meet her.

"So," Tris said after a moment of silence. "What made you bring me here?"

Four looked her over thoughtfully as the roar of the river, maybe thirty meters beneath them, raged on.

"I have some questions to ask you," he said calmly. "Questions I can't ask while others are around."

"Well here I am," Tris said, and Four gave her a serious look before continuing.

"How did you scare the birds away," he asked, and Tris visibly froze as Four stared into her eyes.

"I already told you."

"Don't lie to me Tris," he said forcefully, and his forwardness made Tris feel as though she needed to go on the defensive.

"I'm not lying."

"The monitor started freezing up while you were on the ground. What happened?"

"I don't remember."

"Yes you do."

"No.  _I don't_ ," Tris said stubbornly, and for the first time ever, she saw Four smile genuinely and hold it for longer than a few seconds. He was watching her, taking in the site of her next to him as she slowly began shivering from the cold of the chasm's waters. Tris knew that he must have known her secret, but he wasn't doing anything about it. He was just smiling at her, laughing inwardly no doubt, and the thought made her furious.

"What's so funny if you don't mind me asking?" she snapped, not caring that he was her initiation leader any longer.

"You have no idea how crazy you are, do you?" he said back, and Tris gave him a confused look as she wrapped her arms around herself, wiping her hands clean of dirt and pebbles before doing so.

"You shouldn't be talking about others being crazy," she said. "I wasn't the one who willingly threw knives at an initiate."

"You could have chosen not to take his place."

"Would  _you_  have chosen not to take his place?" Tris asked, and Four shrugged.

"I guess I would have done the same thing," he said, and Tris rolled her eyes as she looked to her lap and her teeth started chattering. The conversation was flowing easily for some reason, not feeling fake or awkward as she had expected it too, but she couldn't let her guard down. Not yet.

Suddenly Four was moving, and Tris jumped. As she looked over at him, she saw him lifting his sweater over his head, and Tris caught a glimpse of a tattoo on his lower back as he pulled the sweater off completely and straightened out the white shirt underneath.

"Here," he said handing her the sweater. Tris only stared at it as she bit the inside of her cheek.

"I'm okay. Thanks," she said, and once again Four smiled at her.

"Why are you all smiles right now? It's weird, seriously," Tris said, and though she meant to sound angry, the words came out soft and light-hearted. Her body was betraying her.

"You'll freeze down here, I should have thought of that before leading you here, I'm sorry," he said, and his words made Tris give him a confused look before sighing and reaching a hand over in order to grab the sweater.

"Thanks," she said.

"No problem," Four murmured, and Tris slowly put her arms into the sweater before pulling it completely over her head.

Wearing a boy's sweater was an experience that Tris couldn't quiet put into words. Four always seemed warm to her, not in an emotional sense, but a literal and physical one. As she pulled her hair up and out of the sweater and let it fall behind her, she paused as she realized just how good it felt to be warmed through by something other than the intense nature of initiation work outs. The sweater was far too big, making Tris have to push the sleeves up in order for her to use her hands, and it smelled of fresh laundry and what could only be described as the world outside of Dauntless. Four must have gone for walks a lot outside of the compound, since an earthy scent seemed to be laced in his clothes. There was something minty in the air around her now, and in that moment of perfect simplicity with Four's black sweater cradling her as she sat next to him by the chasm, she realized that the boy next to her may mean more to her than she had originally wanted him to.

"Tris," Four said, making the girl look back to him as she continued adjusting the large sweater.

"What?"

"How did you get rid of the birds," he asked, but this time it didn't sound like a question.

For a long moment Tris only watched Four as his usually stern features relaxed and gave way to the expression that the average man his age should have. He looked younger now, and for a fleeting moment he reminded her of Caleb.

"Maybe I'll tell you if you tell me about the tattoo on your back," said Tris calmly.

"What if I told you it was meaningless and I just like tattoos?"

"You getting something meaningless? You don't seem the type."

"Tris, I'm serious," said Four, and his usual stern self began slowly creeping back into view. Tris knew now that there as no getting around the inevitable. She trusted Four, and he must have already known her secret. There was no point in trying to hide anything. Suddenly she felt her insides heating up as the threat of tearing up became a serious problem, and she looked away from Four as she sighed heavily before smiling slightly.

"I'm not going to pass initiation," she said, almost chuckling as she let the words run free. It felt good to say it out loud and mean it.

"Why do you say that?" asked Four, but his face suggested that he already knew the answer. Pausing slightly and simply staring into his eyes, Tris closed her eyes and pursed her lips as she forced herself to stay calm. When she opened her eyes again, she found that Four had a look of understanding on his face.

"You  _know_ why," she said, and neither of them moved.

"Tris… You can do it. You can pass."

"Maybe I don't want to."

"What?"

"Maybe I'm tired of fighting," Tris admitted, and as surprised as Four was with her confession, Tris was equally confused. She had barely admitted that small truth to herself let alone considered telling someone else about it. That was the affect that Four had on her. He made her spit out the truth more than she wanted to without even trying.

"You have no idea how strong you are," he said suddenly, and Tris smiled as she wiped at her cheeks even though she hadn't cried.

"People keep saying that about me, I don't know why," she laughed, but Four remained serious as he reached a hand up and brushed a few stray hairs out of Tris's face. The gesture felt so familiar to Tris that she didn't even flinch as he moved closer to her, allowing their legs to touch each others as they sat.

"Does anyone else know?" Four asked, and Tris looked into his eyes as she swallowed back her emotions. She knew exactly what he meant.

"No," she said, hoping that her lie would be believed. Luckily, Four seemed to not care much for the answer as he leaned into her and put an arm around her shoulder. He looked back to the chasm as he did so, and Tris found herself looking toward the waters too as Four's side pressed against hers. He was so much bigger than she was, and he felt like a wall that closed in on her from all sides, making her feel secure as she wiped at her nose and rested her head on his shoulder. What was happening didn't feel real. It was all too good and genuine to be true, so instead of focusing on the past or future, Tris only thought of the moment she was in now, and how nice it felt to have Four reassuring her the way he was.

"So you can control the simulations," Four said, his voice low as he gazed out and into the white waters below.

"Something like that," Tris whispered, and admitting this to Four felt like finally ridding herself of a weight that had been haunting her for years. It was amazing.

"You shouldn't have come to Dauntless. They'll find you here."

"Who is _they_? Why am I such a threat?"

"' _They'_ is everyone who isn't like you Tris. You don't fit into a single faction. You threaten the balance."

"You sound like an Erudite. I haven't done anything wrong. That can't be the only reason why they hunt us. Why am I so dangerous?"

"Nothing about what you are is dangerous, not in my opinion at least," Four said, and Tris paused to breath as she once again felt the urge to cry build within her.

"I'll teach you how to hide it better," Four said.

"Why do you want to help me?" asked Tris, and Four couldn't help but laugh for a reason that was beyond Tris.

"You really are oblivious for some reason aren't you?"

"Excuse me?"

"Forget it," Four smiled, and he pulled his arm away from her shoulder. Using one hand, he gently grabbed Tris's chin and directed her toward him. For a moment they held eye contact, and before Tris could react, Four was leaning closer, and their lips touched.

They held this pose for a long time, and when Four eventually pulled away, Tris found herself lost in his eyes as he stared down at her.

"Don't give up Tris," he said. "Because _I_ won't give up on you."

"Okay," she whispered awkwardly, and Four smiled as Tris's cheeks went red.

"Don't be afraid," he said. "While we were down here, you're times were posted for phase two."

"Oh my God. How could you let me miss that?"

"I thought you'd like it here better, since you don't seem to like a lot of attention."

"Why would I get a lot of attention after the times were posted?"  
"Why do you think?" Four asked, and Tris's jaw nearly dropped to the floor.

"Don't tell me…" she started, and Four's expression changed from light-hearted to full on instructor mode in a matter of seconds.

"That's right," Four said. "As of now… You're ranked first."

***

Tris and Four had talked for a very long time, and as she watched Four walk off toward the Pit, she sighed as she thought of the moon and stars that were sure to be above her. Was Caleb looking at the sky in that moment too? The thought upset her, so instead of thinking of her old life, memories of her new one took their place.

The feel of Four's arm around her shoulders still lingered on her skin as she walked idly along the edge of the chasm, its waters rabid and seething with white foam, spraying her ankles with a soft mist. Still, she couldn't stop thinking of Caleb.

" _If he's in the games and so am I, will I be able to do it? Will I… Kill him to survive?"_ she asked herself, and of course the answer to her question was no. Caleb was the only family she had left. Hurting him was the last thing she wanted to do.

Instead of going back to the dorm room, Tris chose to stay near the chasm as she gently ran her tongue across her lips. She had been kissed, and it was one of the simplest yet most amazing moments of her life. Looking down, she smiled to herself as she realized that she was still wearing Four's sweater.

"He'll get this tomorrow," she said to herself, almost giddy with a sort of joy that she had never felt before. Four must have liked her, a lot in fact, if we was willing to understand that she was divergent and not turn her over to the Erudite. The weight of the information she so easily gave away to him was sure to weigh him down exponentially, yet he walked away from her with ease as he smiled over his shoulder at her. Tris was as likely to kiss Peter and enjoy it as Four was to betray her and reveal to the world that divergents were alive again. She couldn't stop smiling now, and in that moment nothing was missing from her life.

Reaching her left hand out Tris touched the cave wall beside her and let her fingertips play against its soaked surface. Deciding to finally go to bed, she walked up the cave path and rounded the corner, entering the pit slowly and silently. It was dark now in this area of Dauntless, as it was late at night and no one wanted to start another round of phase two with no sleep.

She was walking far too slowly, and at this pace she wouldn't get back to her bed before midnight. The other initiates must have been in bed by ten o'clock, so she hoped that no one would be awake to see her walk in.

Tris swept a portion of her hair out of her eyes as Four had done earlier, and smiled again as she remembered the touch of his lips against hers.

" _Everything will be okay now,"_  she thought to herself, and just as she was about to begin walking across the Pit in order to go to bed, the sound of footsteps to her left made her jump.

Her head swerved to the side where the noise had come from, but she could see nothing through the darkness. She thought of calling out and asking who was there, but chose to remain silent as she looked back to the direction of the initiate dorm room. There was no one with her in the Pit, she just needed to relax.

Suddenly there was a small scrapping sound against the stone walls to her left again, and Tris gasped as she looked back to the same spot as before.

" _Is someone there?"_  she thought to herself, and before she could react two figures came running out of the darkness.

The shock made her open her nearly scream, but before she could a hand reached out and clamped itself over her mouth. A set of arms wrapped themselves around her mid section and began lifting her into the air while another grabbed hold of her left wrist.

With her right hand she threw out a punch wildly into the darkness, but missed whoever was grabbing her. A flurry of information swam at the front of her conscious now, giving her directions that didn't make sense. She wanted to scream while other parts of her wanted to run while other parts wanted to fight. Panic raced through her, making it hard to breath as another person grabbed at her flailing legs and swept them up and into the air.

"Get her up!" shouted a voice, and instantly Tris recognized who it belonged to. It was Peter.

Fighting hard now as the shock of the blind attack ebbed away, Tris closed her eyes as she tried to part her lips in order to bite the hand that was over her mouth.

"The chasm!" another boy whispered angrily, grunting with effort as he tugged at her legs. "To the chasm!"

Tris was being carried now, and as she fought and wiggled her body as hard as she could, she realized that whoever the people were that were holding onto her were hoping to kill her.

They were moving fast, and Tris continued to jerk her arms and legs as hard as she could in order to try and break free, but her attackers would not let go, and suddenly she could hear the rushing waters of the chasms river. They were close now, and she was only moments away from being thrown into its depths.

" _Focus focus focus, think, breathe. Think,"_ her survival instincts were speaking directly to her, but its voice came in a panicked and hurried sort of way that only made Tris more confused as she tried to remember how she had gotten into this position.

"Push her over! Through her in!" said a boys voice, and in that moment, all things became clear to Tris.

There were three people who wanted her dead, and one of them was Peter. The other two were boys, she knew this because one of their voices was too deep to be a girl, and the other one was tall and thick with muscle. The shock of the initial attack was gone, and all that was left now was her will to survive.

Opening her eyes Tris twisted her body to the right hard as she managed to open her mouth and bite down on the boys hand that was there. She tasted blood as she heard Peter cry boy who was holding her legs lost his grip as she twisted, and her ankles slammed against the stone floor above the chasm with a painful crack. With her arms still being held she moved quickly and pushed herself back with her legs, making the boy gripping her triceps behind her stumble. She kicked out with her right leg, and connected with Peters shin. He recovered quickly and punched down hard into her eye as he looked to the other boy and told him to grab her legs while he grabbed the other. In seconds Tris was back to where she was before, unable to shake the hands off her that were so close to ending her life.

" _Breathe! Focus!"_ she screamed inwardly, and as she willed her limbs to keep fighting, she took in a deep breath, and nearly froze as she caught the faint scent of lemongrass coming from the boy behind her. She recognized that smell. At night, it was something that soothed her into sleep. The third attacker was Al.

The boys were closer to the edge now, Tris knew this because she could feel cold sprays of mist playing against the back of her neck. Her body burned with fatigue as she continued to struggle, and just as she was sure one of the boys was going to toss her over the edge, the boy behind Tris let go of her arms, and she fell down onto her back with a thud.

Her head hit the ground hard after her back did, and for a moment she saw black stars pop in and out of the space in front of her, but moments later she was back in the present moment and realized that the other two boys had let go of her legs. Tris gasped for air, pushing herself up and into a standing position as fast as she could while she looked around herself.

The three boys who had dragged her all that way were now fighting against someone else, someone who had come to keep Tris from dying. As she squinted through the darkness, she instantly recognized who it was. It was Four.

The sound of bone meeting bone slapped itself across the stretch of tunnel and made Tris jump as one of the boys fell to the ground.

Four was moving fast, taking on all three of the boys with ease as he blocked punches and kicks as if he were fighting infants instead of young adults. Still, Tris couldn't let him be outnumbered, so she began running toward him as she saw the boy that must have been Peter go to kick Four from behind. Without thinking she leaned forward with her shoulder and rammed into him, making them both fall to the floor. At this point, one of the three boys had run off, while the other stood frozen for a moment, and while Tris watched him Peter pushed her off of his back as he stood and ran in the opposite direction of Four.

Tris pushed herself up and saw that the remaining boy must have been Al. Four went to move toward him, but Tris caught his arm as she ran forward.

"Wait!" she yelled in order to stop Four, and as soon as she spoke Al turned and ran, disappearing into the darkness of the tunnels connecting to the chasm drop off.

Turning around suddenly, Four grabbed Tris by the arms as he looked her over quickly.

"Your eye," he said without emotion, and Tris couldn't shake the adrenaline coursing through her that made everything feel as if it were moving in fast motion.

"It's fine," she gasped, and suddenly Four was pushing her behind him as the sound of multiple footsteps came flooding through the tunnel.

"Who's that?" Tris found herself asking, even though she was too tired to actually question anything.

"I don't know," said Four, his tone flat. He seemed ready for anything.

As the footsteps came closer, Tris thought back to the horror of the attack and the numb ache that realizing that Al wanted her dead brought her, only now the ache was transforming into a serious and throbbing pain.

"Shouldn't we run?" asked Tris, but the voice didn't feel as though it came from her body.

"No. If its more people that are after you, I'm throwing them into the chasm," replied Four, and Tris shuddered as she realized how serious and angry he was.

The footsteps were much closer now, and Tris found herself shrinking behind Four when she really wanted to stand beside him and fight, but the want to fight fled her body as two familiar people rounded the tunnels corner and emerged onto the narrow path that dropped off at one side to the chasm's river below.

"You have to be kidding me," said Four angrily, and Tris looked out slowly from behind Four's back to see an alert looking Eric standing a few meters away from herself and Four. And beside Eric stood a girl with a long dark haired braid flowing over her left shoulder. Eric and Katniss must have come running to the chasm together when they heard the struggle, but all Tris could focus on was the voice in her head asking why the two of them had come together.

***

"Tris?" said Katniss in surprise.

"Katniss?" Tris said back, and Four and Eric locked eyes harshly as they straightened out their postures and cleared their throats.

Stepping forward slightly, Four spoke loud and clear over the roar of the chasm's river.

"Tris was being attacked by three other initiates," he said, and finally getting over the shock of seeing Eric and Katniss walk onto the scene of the crime together, Tris stepped forward and stood beside Four.

"That so," said Eric, his tone serious and deadpan just as Four's was.

"Who was it?" asked Katniss, ignoring Four and looking directly to Tris.

" _Why are you with Eric?"_  was what Tris wanted to say back, but instead she decided to answer the girls question passively.

"I think we have a lot to talk about," she said, almost smiling uncomfortably as she remembered Katniss saying those exact words to her in the morning. Katniss frowned deeply at her words.

"So," Eric began, not breaking eye contact with Four. "You fought them off?"

"Yes," said Four.

"Nice to see our number one initiate can fend for herself then," smirked Eric, and Tris saw both Katniss and Four give him a dirty look.

"I think Tris being ranked first may be why she was targeted," said Four, and Eric visibly held himself back from rolling his eyes dramatically.

"Of course it was," he snapped, and Tris looked away from him and back to Katniss as the tension between Eric and Four intensified.

Suddenly, Tris realized something. Looking at Katniss standing next to Eric made her think of the contradictory nature of everything that made up the girl in comparison to herself. There was something innately dark about her, and she was far stronger than Tris physically. Something about her was cold and calculating, always thinking of the current situation and how to get past an obstacle in the now. While Tris found that she was one to think more of the future and the good of all while she made a decision. Looking between Eric and Katniss made Tris realize that the two shared astonishing similarities just as herself and Four did. Katniss and Eric seemed to foil, in a literary sense, Four and herself almost perfectly.

Finishing his short conversation with Eric, Four turned around as he grabbed Tris's hand, and instantly Tris looked down to Eric's hand as she slowly turned in time with Four. She saw Eric's hand twitch as it neared Katniss', but it didn't grab hers.

He wanted to. Eric wanted to grab Katniss' hand the way that Four had grabbed Tris's, but he didn't, and Katniss hadn't noticed or cared. Now three questions remained in Tris's mind as she silently looked away from Katniss and Eric as she followed Four. The first was why Katniss was with Eric this late at night, and the second asked what Peeta would think of the two of them getting closer. And the last question asked what she would do when she ran into Al the next morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Time: Tris confronts Al and is surprised with the results. Also, round two of initiation ends, and the initiates ranked under 21 are cut.


End file.
